Part 11

The coal-tit of our country (_P. britannicus_) differs slightly from the continental form (_P. ater_), the British bird having the slate-grey of the upper parts suffused with brown or olive, while in the continental form the brown tinge is confined to the rump. The European coal-tit visits our islands on migration, and doubtless interbreeds with our bird, as intermediate varieties are found.

The coal-tit, or coalmouse, like the oxeye and the blue tit, is generally diffused throughout the British Islands, and is not uncommon, although nowhere abundant. In Scotland it is more local in its distribution, being found chiefly in districts abounding in pine and fir woods. It is believed to be increasing in numbers and extending its range in this country. In its social habits, its flight, and its manner of seeking its food--during which it clings to the smaller boughs and twigs in a variety of positions--it closely resembles the other members of its genus. It also resembles them in its language, although a shriller note may be detected in its voice, both in its call-note and song. It differs from other tits in its greater activity, in preferring conifers to other trees, in going more often to the ground to feed, and in being a greater wanderer out of the breeding season.

The nest, as a rule, is placed near the ground, in a hole in a rotten tree-stump, or in a wall, or any other suitable place. It is composed of moss, hair, and feathers, felted together, and lined with more feathers. Six to eight eggs are laid, like those of the great tit in colour. Like the oxeye, it is omnivorous, but in summer it feeds principally on insects.

After the breeding season the old and young birds keep together, and several families may unite and form a flock. One of the most interesting winter sights in a wood composed of pine and fir growing together with beech and other deciduous trees is afforded by a wandering flock of coal-tits. As they move from tree to tree they attract other species of similar habits--the oxeye and blue and marsh tits, and goldcrests, and siskins, and perhaps a couple of tree-creepers. Occasionally a party of long-tailed tits will join, and keep with the flock for some time; but the long-tails are the most restless and vagrant of all, and eventually hurry on by themselves, leaving the more patient plodders behind. It is wonderful and very beautiful to see so many species thus drawn into companionship by a common social instinct, and by a similar manner of seeking their food; a mental likeness serves to keep them together for hours at a time, or for a whole day, in spite of so great a diversity in form and colour and language.

Marsh-Titmouse.

Parus palustris.

Forehead, crown, head, and nape black; upper parts grey; wings dark grey, lighter at the edges; cheeks, throat, and breast dull white. Length, four inches and a half.

* * * * *

It is curious that, of the seven species of birds inhabiting this country called titmice in the vernacular, six have been named from some character that strikes the eye: greater size in one, a peculiar feather-ornament in two, and in the remaining species a distinctive shape or colour; and the names in all cases are suitable--bearded, long-tailed, great, blue, coal, and crested. In the one case where this rule has been neglected the name is unsuitable and misleading. The marsh-tit may be more partial to low or wet ground than the blue tit, and oxeye, and coal-tit, but the bird is found everywhere--in woods, groves, hedgerows, orchards, and gardens--and in autumn and winter is seen associating with the other species in their wandering bands. But it would have been difficult to name this species from its colouring, which is more uniform and sober than in any of the others. He is the plainest of them all, but in his lively, social habits, and in his various pretty motions and attitudes, he is one of the family; and so strong in him is the family likeness, that some find it not easy to distinguish marsh-tit from coal-tit, except when seen closely. In its language, also, it is unmistakably a titmouse; but it is not so vociferous as the oxeye and blue tit, and its tinkering voice is not so sharp and loud.

The nest is placed in a rotten stump or trunk of a tree, an old pollarded willow being a favourite site; and sometimes the bird excavates a hole for itself in the decayed wood. The nest is made of moss and hair, felted together, and lined with willow down. The eggs are five or six in number, and are similar to those of the great tit in colouring.

The marsh-tit is common in England, rarer in Scotland, and does not extend to Ireland.

Blue Titmouse.

Parus cæruleus.

Crown blue encircled with white; cheeks white bordered with dark blue; back olive-green; wings and tail bluish; greater coverts and secondaries tipped with white; breast and belly yellow, traversed by a dark blue line. Length, four and a half inches.

* * * * *

The blue tit is a commoner species than the oxeye, and is even more widely diffused in this country, its range extending from the Channel Islands to the northernmost parts of Scotland, and it has been found as a straggler in the Orkneys and the Shetlands. All the qualities that distinguish the tits and make them such engaging birds are found in a marked degree in the present species--sociability; extreme vivacity, especially in the cold season; and the power to assume an endless variety of graceful positions when clinging to the slender branches and twigs, upright or pendulous, of the leafless trees in winter. And as the blue tit is more abundant, and more familiar with man, than the others, besides having a gayer colouring, he is the favourite member of his genus. He promises, indeed, to become in time our first feathered favourite; for though he is without melody, and does not come to us with a glad message, like the swallow, and has no ancient sentiment and nursery literature, like the robin, to help him to the front, he possesses one unfailing attraction--he is an amusing creature. Perhaps our progenitors were less susceptible in that way than we are, and took no notice of the tomtit and his vagaries. In winter he may be easily won with a little food; and when he joins the mixed company of sparrows, dunnocks, blackbirds, and starlings that come to the door for crumbs and scraps, he is by contrast among them a ‘winged jewel’--a small wanderer from the tropics. In works of ornithology you will find the blue tit described as a little acrobat and harlequin, droll and grotesque and fantastic in his ways; and if this Puck among our feathered fairies can win expressions such as these from the gravest scientific writers, it is not strange that ordinary folk should find him so fascinating.

The language of the blue tit resembles that of the oxeye. Its voice is not so powerful, but the various sounds, the call and love notes, or song, composed of one note repeated several times without variation, have similar sharp, incisive, and somewhat metallic qualities.

In spring the wandering little companies break up, and about the end of April breeding begins. The nest is placed in a hole in a tree or wall, or wherever a suitable cavity is found. It is loosely formed of dry grass or moss, lined with wool, hair, and a quantity of feathers. Five to eight eggs are usually laid, in some cases as many as twelve and fourteen; in colour they are like those of the great tit, and, as in the case of that species, the incubating bird sits closely on her eggs and hisses like a snake when interfered with.

The blue tit is omnivorous in its diet. In summer it feeds principally on caterpillars, aphides, and insects of all kinds, sometimes catching them on the wing. At other seasons it eats fruit and seeds of various kinds, buds, flesh, and, in fact, almost anything it can get.

Crested Titmouse.

Parus cristatus.

Feathers of the crown elongated, and forming when erected a pointed crest, black, edged with white; cheeks and sides of the neck white; throat, collar, and a streak across the temples black; all the other parts reddish brown; lower parts white, faintly tinged with red. Length, four inches and three-quarters.

[Illustration: FIG. 35.--CRESTED TIT. ⅓ natural size.]

* * * * *

The crested tit is one of the rarest and most local of British birds, being restricted to a few extensive pine-forests in the north of Scotland; indeed, there are few who know it from personal observation in this country. Although modest in colour, it is a pretty little bird, and its high, pointed crest gives it a somewhat distinguished appearance. In its language and habits it resembles the other members of the genus, and associates in the same way with birds of different species. Like the coal-tit, it makes its nest in a hole in a rotten tree-stump, and it will also breed in a crow’s or magpie’s old nest, or a squirrel’s drey. The nest is made of dry grass, moss, wool, hair, fur, and feathers, thinly felted together; and five or six eggs are laid, white in ground-colour, spotted and speckled with brownish red.

Nuthatch.

Sitta cæsia.

[Illustration: FIG. 36.--NUTHATCH. ¼ natural size.]

Upper parts bluish grey; a black streak across the eye; cheeks and throat white; breast and belly buff; flank and lower tail-coverts chestnut-red; outer tail feathers black, with a white spot near the end tipped with grey, the two central ones grey; beak bluish black, the lower mandible white at the base; feet light brown. Length, five inches and a half.

* * * * *

The nuthatch, although a small bird, not brightly coloured, and scarcely deserving the name of songster, exercises a singular attraction; and if it were possible to canvass all those who love birds, and have not fewer than half a dozen favourites, it is probable that in a great majority of cases the nuthatch would be found among them. When I see him sitting quite still for a few moments on a branch of a tree in his most characteristic nuthatch attitude, on or under the branch, perched horizontally or vertically, with head or tail uppermost, but always with the body placed beetle-wise against the bark, head raised, and the straight, sharp bill pointing like an arm lifted to denote attention--at such times he looks less like a living than a sculptured bird, a bird cut out of a beautifully variegated marble--blue-grey, buff, and chestnut--and placed against the tree to deceive the eye. The figure is so smooth and compact, the tints so soft and stone-like; and when he is still, he is so wonderfully still, and his attitude so statuesque! But he is never long still, and when he resumes his lively, eccentric, up-and-down and sideway motions he is interesting in another way. One is not soon tired of watching his perpetual mouse-like, independent-of-the-earth’s-gravity perambulations over the surface of the trunk and branches. He is like a small woodpecker who has broken loose from the woodpecker’s somewhat narrow laws of progression, preferring to be a law unto himself.

Without a touch of brilliant colour, the nuthatch is a beautiful bird on account of the pleasing softness and harmonious disposition of his tints; and, in like manner, without being a songster in the strict sense of the word, his voice is so clear and far-reaching, and of so pleasant a quality, that it often gives more life and spirit to the woods and orchards and avenues he frequents than that of many true melodists. This is more especially the case in the month of March, before the migratory songsters have arrived, and when he is most loquacious. A high-pitched, clear, ringing note, repeated without variation several times, is his most often-heard call or song. He will sometimes sit motionless on his perch, repeating this call at short intervals, for half an hour at a time. Another bird at a distance will be doing the same, and the two appear to be answering one another. He also has another call, not so loud and piercing, but more melodious: a double note, repeated two or three times, with something liquid and gurgling in the sound, suggesting the musical sound of lapping water. These various notes and calls are heard incessantly until the young are hatched, when the birds all at once become silent.

A hole in the trunk or branch of a large tree is used as a nesting-place, the entrance, if too large, being walled up with clay, only a small opening to admit the bird being left. At the extremity of the hole a bed of dry leaves is made. The eggs are five to seven in number, white, and spotted with brownish red, sometimes with purple. When the sitting-bird is interfered with she defends her treasures with great courage, hissing like the wryneck, and vigorously striking at the aggressor with her sharp bill.

The food of the nuthatch during a greater portion of the year consists of small insects and their larvæ, found in the crevices of the bark; hence the bird is most often seen frequenting old rough-barked trees, the oak being a special favourite, more especially if it happens to be well covered with lichen. At times, when seeking its prey, its rapid and vigorous blows on the bark or portion of rotten wood can be heard at a considerable distance, and are frequently mistaken for those of the woodpecker. In autumn the nuthatch feeds largely on nuts and fruit-stones, and to get at the kernel he carries the nut to a tree, and wedges it firmly in a crevice or in the angle made by a forked branch, then hammers at the end with his sharp beak until the shell is split open and the kernel disclosed. Its love of nuts makes it easy to attract the bird to a tree or wall close to the house by fixing nuts in the crevices. If supplied regularly with this kind of food it soon grows trustful, and may even be taught to come to call, and even to catch morsels of food thrown to it in the air. Canon Atkinson, in his lively and interesting ‘Sketches in Natural History,’ has described the amusing manners of a pair of nuthatches which he thus made tame by feeding. Since his book was published, about twenty-five years ago, many persons have adopted the same plan with success.

Wren.

Troglodytes parvulus.

Upper parts reddish brown with transverse dusky bars; quills barred alternately with black and reddish brown; tail dusky, barred with black; over the eye a pale narrow streak; under parts pale reddish brown; flanks and thighs marked with dark streaks. Length, three inches and a half.

* * * * *

[Illustration: FIG. 37.--WREN. ¼ natural size.]

The little nut-brown wren--nut-like, too, in his smallness and round, compact figure--with cocked-up tail and jerky motions and gesticulations, and flight as of a fairy partridge with rapidly-beating, short wings, that produce a whirring noise if you are close enough to hear it, is a familiar creature to almost every person throughout the three kingdoms, and is even more generally diffused than the house-sparrow. Something of the feeling which we have for the swallow, the house-martin, and the robin redbreast, falls to the share of the small wren. He is one of the few general favourites, although, perhaps, not so great a favourite as the others just named. The reason of this is, doubtless, because he is less domestic, never so familiar with man or tolerant of close observation. The wren is never tame nor unsuspicious; he is less dependent on us than other small birds that attach themselves to human habitations, never a ‘pensioner’ in the same degree as the blue tit, dunnock, blackbird, and sparrow. The minute spiders, chrysalids, earwigs, and wood-lice with other creeping things to be found in obscure holes and corners in wood-piles, ivy-covered walls, and outhouses, are more to his taste than the ‘sweepings of the threshold.’ His small size, modest colouring, and secrecy; his activity, and habit of seeking his food in holes and dark places which are not explored by other insectivorous species, enable him to exist in a great variety of conditions--gardens, orchards, deep woods, open commons, hedgerows, rocky shores, swamps, mountains, and moors; there are, indeed, few places where the small, busy wren is not to be met with. This ability of the wren to find everywhere in nature a neglected corner to occupy would appear to give it a great advantage over other small birds; moreover, it is very prolific, and excepting, perhaps, two species of tits, is more successful than any other small bird in rearing large broods of young. Nevertheless, the wrens do not seem to increase. At the end of summer they are very abundant, and you will, perhaps, be able to count a dozen birds where only one pair appeared in spring; but when spring comes again you will generally find that the population has fallen back to its old numbers. The larger increase in summer indicates a greater mortality during the rest of the year than is suffered by other species. The wren is said to eat fruit occasionally, and even seeds; but it is almost exclusively insectivorous, and probably perishes in large numbers during periods of frost, when larks, pipits, and titmice become seed-eaters. Yet the wren is a hardy little bird, a resident all the year round in the coldest parts of our country, and one of the few songsters which may be heard in all seasons. Even during a frost, if the sun shines, the wren will sing as gaily as in summer. His song is his greatest charm. It is unlike that of any other British melodist--a loud, bright lyric, the fine, clear, high-pitched notes and trills issuing in a continuous rapid stream from beginning to end. Although rapid, and ending somewhat abruptly, it is a beautiful and finished performance, in which every note is distinctly enunciated and has its value. When near it sounds very loud: one is surprised to hear so loud a song from so small a creature. But it does not carry far: the notes of the song-thrush, blackbird, and nightingale can be heard at nearly three times the distance.

The wren begins his nest-building at the end of April, and in selecting a site exercises a greater freedom than most small birds. The nests may be found in trees, bushes, masses of ivy or other dense vegetation, hedgerows, holes in banks and walls, crevices in rocks, in furze-bushes, and close to the ground among the bramble-bushes. There is also a great variety in the materials used in building different nests. As a rule, one kind of material is used for the outer part of the structure, which is domed, and very large for the bird. It may be moss or dead leaves, or moss and leaves woven together, or dry grass leaves and stems, or dead fern-fronds. The nest is not only well concealed, but in most cases the outside is made to assimilate in colour to the vegetation surrounding it. The opening is near the top of the nest; inside, the cavity is lined with moss, hair, and feathers. Four or five eggs are laid, often a larger number, and it is not unusual to find as many as eight or nine eggs in a nest. Not long ago, in a wood in Berkshire, I saw eight young wrens sitting in a row on a branch near the ground, and watched them being fed by the old birds. The eggs are pure white, thinly spotted with pinkish red. Two broods are reared in the season. Imperfect or false nests are often found near the nest containing the eggs, and are called ‘cocks’ nests,’ the belief being that they are made by the male bird.

Pied Wagtail.

Motacilla lugubris.

[Illustration: FIG. 38.--PIED WAGTAIL. ¼ natural size.]

Summer plumage variegated with white and black; back and scapulars, chin, throat, and neck black; a small portion of the side of the neck white. Winter plumage: back and scapulars ash-grey; chin and throat white, with a black, but not entirely isolated, gorget. Length, seven and a half inches.

* * * * *

The pied wagtail is probably not more abundant in this country than the yellow wagtail, but is far better known, being a more generally diffused species, often seen in the neighbourhood of houses where the yellow wagtail never comes. And if there be a pied wagtail anywhere within range of sight, it is sure to be seen and recognised, for in its black-and-white plumage it is the most conspicuous small bird in this country, not excepting the kingfisher, snow-bunting and blackbird. When tripping about a smooth lawn he looks double his real size, and reminds one of a magpie in a field or an oyster-catcher on a wide stretch of level sand.

The pied wagtail is found in this country all the year round, but many birds (probably the large majority) migrate annually. Knox, in his ‘Ornithological Rambles in Sussex,’ says that they arrive on the Sussex coast about the middle of March, the old males first, the females and the males of the previous year a few days later. They are sometimes seen in large numbers near the coast, resting after their voyage before proceeding inland. The return migration takes place at the end of August or early in September.

Meadows and pasture-lands in the neighbourhood of a running stream are favourite resorts of the wagtail, and it is fond of attending cattle for the sake of the numbers of insects driven from their shelter in the grass by the grazing animals.

The pied wagtail is not so lively, quick, and graceful as the yellow and the grey species; but if you watch him for any length of time he, too, gives you the idea of a creature that never continues in the same mind for a minute at a time, but acts according to the impulse of the moment, and is as unstable as a ball of thistle-down. He runs, then stands, and shakes his tail; for two or three moments he searches for food; then chases an insect, and is still again, waiting for a new impulse to move him:--suddenly he flies away, not straight, as if with an object in view, but with a curving, dipping, erratic flight, governed seemingly by no will; and just as suddenly alighting again, when he is once more seen standing still and shaking his tail. The call-note, a sharp chirp of two syllables, is emitted once or twice during flight. The song is a loud, hurried warble, uttered on the wing as the bird hovers at a moderate height from the ground. But the pied wagtail has another way of singing, especially in early spring: this is a warble so low that at the distance of fifteen yards it is just audible, and is sometimes uttered continuously for two or three minutes at a stretch.

The nest is made, as a rule, in a hollow or cavity in the ground, or in a crevice or hole in a bank or rock, or under a stone, or at the roots of a furze-bush. It is built of fine dry grass, moss, and various other materials, and lined with hair and feathers. The eggs are four or five, pale bluish in tint, and spotted with greyish brown.

Grey Wagtail.

Motacilla melanope.