Skip to main content

Beak of the Week - Brown-headed Nuthatch

Brown-headed Nuthatch
(Sitta pusilla)
Family: Sittidae

Often found clinging to tree trunks and branches, the Brown-headed Nuthatch is equally at home climbing upward and downward among the high branches of pine forests. Their rather unique habit of walking down tree trunks headfirst may appear silly, but it comes in handy when they are foraging for insects in the deep crevices of pine bark or gathering seeds from within pine cones.

The Brown-headed Nuthatch appears large-billed, short-legged, and short-tailed, especially for a bird that’s only 4 ½ inches long. It has a dark bluish-gray back and is white below, with a brown cap on the top of its head. Flocks of Brown-headed Nuthatches are most often heard before they are seen, their repetitive squeaky calls sounding like rubber ducks high in the treetops. Though Brown-headed Nuthatches are usually seen in small groups throughout the year, they occasionally join mixed-species flocks with chickadees and woodpeckers during the winter months.

During the breeding season, Brown-headed Nuthatch pairs will excavate a hole in a tree in which to build their nest. These nest holes are usually between 5 and 15 feet above the ground, but they will also make use of birdhouses and existing holes from old woodpecker nests when available. Though the female will typically remain on the nest to incubate their eggs and rely on the male to bring her food, some nesting pairs are known have an additional “helper” male that also brings food to the female and young in the nest.

By Aidan Healey, Conservation Technician, Houston Audubon
Photos by Greg Lavaty
---
Visit our Bird Gallery to learn about other Texas birds.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to DIY a Dripper for birds

Are you running out of home projects to keep busy during the quarantine? Here’s one my hubby made for me that you can try: a DYI Dripper. I’ve long wanted a bird dripper to complement my yard’s wildlife habitat, and with spring migrants on the way, I was keen to provide a drip that will attract new birds that don’t visit feeders. I had a problem though. There is no water line or power source near my feeders. The idea of stringing a hose or wire across the driveway just isn’t practical. Enter the engineer. My husband thought about the location and the limitations for a bit, and came up with the concept of sourcing water for a dripper off the sprinkler system. By using a toilet tank that fills every time the sprinklers run, water can be constantly available for the drip. I nixed the idea of a toilet tank sitting in my yard though, so he made some aesthetic modifications by installing a toilet tank float inside a 5 gallon bucket hidden inside a custom wooden box with a handsome copper p...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Purple Martin Spectacle

July on the upper Texas Coast is hot – too hot for many of us to enjoy getting out and birding. However, the early mornings and early evenings can be bearable, and provide an opportunity to see some of the birds that will soon be leaving us. Fortunately, we have our resident birds to enjoy and, come fall, our wintering birds will begin arriving. But that means the birds we consider our "summer birds" will soon be departing and will not return until next spring. A few of these include the Chimney Swift, Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, Common Nighthawk, Barn Swallow, Mississippi Kite, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, and many others. One of our iconic summer birds is the Purple Martin , our largest swallow, and the only swallow we have that is all dark. While it is called a Purple Martin, this bird is more of a blue-black with some purplish sheen when the sunlight hits the feathers at a certain angle. Many birders anticipate the early arrival of “scouts,” a term used for the arrival o...
Post a Comment
Read more