LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN NUTHATCHES, 

 WRENS, THRASHERS, AND THEIR ALLIES 



ORDER PASSERIFORMES (FA^IILIES SITTIDAE, CERTHIIDAE, 

 CHAMAEIDAE, CINCLIDAE, TROGLODYTIDAE, and MLMIDAE) 



By Aethtir Cleveland Bext 



Taunton, Ma^s. 



Order PASSERIFORMES 

 Family SITTIDAE : Nuthatches 



SITTA CAROUNENSIS COOKEI Oberhober 



WHITE-BREASTED NUTHATCH 



Plates 1-4 



CONTBIBUTED BY WlNSOB MaBEBTT TtUIB 

 HABITS 



The white-breasted nuthatch is a droll, earnest little bird, rather 

 sedate and unemotional. He is no great musician and seems to lack 

 a sense of humor. He has none of the irrepressible fidgetiness of the 

 house "wren, none of the charming happiness of the song sparrow ; he 

 appears to take life on a matter-of-fact level. He is short-necked, 

 broad-shouldered, sturdy, quick and sure in his motions, suggesting an 

 athlete, and as we study him on his daily roimd. as he hops up and 

 down over the bark, we see that he is an athlete with marked skill as 

 an acrobat, like the tumbling kind, as much at home upside down as 

 right side up. 



It is a characteristic pose of the nuthatch, perhaps unique among 

 birds, to stand head downward on the trunk of a tree with the neck 

 extended backward, the bill pointing straight outward from the bark. 



Spring and courtship. — If we have had a male nuthatch under our 

 eye through the winter, either a bird roaming through a bit of wood- 

 land or one visiting our feeding station daily, we notice, as spring ap- 

 proaches, a change in his behavior : he begins to sing freely at all times 

 of day, whereas previously he sang sparingly and only in the morning 



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