Birdcraft/Sitta carolinensis
Plate 11.
1. White-breasted Nuthatch.
Length, 5.50–6 inches.
2. Brown Creeper.
Length, 5.50 inches.
- Length:
- 5.50—6 inches.
- Male and Female:
- Body flat and compact. Above slate-blue. Top of head and nape black. Wings slate, edged with brown. Outer tail feathers brownish with white bars. Belly white, rusty toward vent. Bill dark lead-colour, feet dark brown. Female paler with colour boundaries less distinctly marked.
- Song:
- A call, “Quank—quank-quank!" and a few other notes.
- Season:
- A common resident, roving about all winter.
- Breeds:
- Freely in all parts of range.
- Nest:
- In tree holes, which it excavates with great patience, and lines with feathers, moss, etc., after the fashion of Titmice.
- Eggs:
- Often 10, white, speckled with red and lilac.
- Range:
- Southern British Provinces and eastern United States to the Rocky Mountains.
This Nuthatch, who is our most conspicuous bird-acrobat, persistently walking head downward and performing various tortuous feats while he searches for food, is a resident of the eastern United States, only leaving the most northerly parts of his range for a short time in winter.
He appears to migrate in spring and return in autumn, but in reality only retreats to the woodlands to breed, emerging again when the food supply grows scant in the autumn.
The Nuthatches are great friends of the Kinglets and Titmice, and often travel in flocks with them. They pass for being shy, but are not so in reality, but merely elusive because of their restless habits, which seldom allow them to stay in one spot long enough to be examined. In fact “tree mice,” the local name our farmers give them, is quite appropriate.
This species has a particularly adroit way of knocking off bits of decayed or loose bark with the beak, to obtain the grubs or larvae hidden beneath. They never suck the sap from trees, as is sometimes supposed, but are wholly beneficial to vegetation.