CRESTED TITMOUSE 



525 



blackness than that of the willow-titmouse, which is brownish or 

 sooty black. In the latter, again, the tail is distinctly graduated, 

 instead of being almost squared. To these differences may be added 

 the darker rufous colour of the flanks and under-parts of the willow- 

 titmouse. The British bird, which has a dull black crown, differs from 

 the Scandinavian Panis atricapillus boj'ealis, as well as from the Alpine 

 P. a. )iio?it(i)iiis, but is closely allied to P. a. rJietiajius, from which it 

 only differs in its smaller size and browner and darker upper surface. 



Crested Titmouse ^" account of the elongation of the feathers of the 

 (Parus eristatus) crown of the head so as to form an erectile pointed 

 crest, the crested titmouse (together with several 

 foreign species) is frequently separated from the more typical members 

 of the group and placed in a genus apart, when it is known as 

 Lophophanes cjistatus. Such re- 

 finement in classification is, how- 

 ever, unnecessary, at least for 

 ordinary bird-students. 



As regards colouring, the feathers 

 of the crest are black, but the rest 

 of the head, except for a crescent- 

 like black patch starting behind the 

 ear-coverts on each side, and ulti- 

 mately joining another black area 

 on the throat and breast by way 

 of the back of the neck, is white ; 

 the back and wings are olive-brown, 

 the flanks are buffish, and the abdo- 

 men is white. In hens the crest is 

 shorter, and there is less black on 

 the throat ; and in the young bird 

 the development of the crest is still 

 less marked. 



As the crested titmouse is 

 mainly a frequenter of pine-forests, its distribution is necessarily local 

 and scattered. That it is a hardy bird ma\' be inferred from the fact 

 that in Norway it ranges up to latitude 64', and also from its absence 

 in Greece, Italy south of the Alps, and Asia Minor. Eastwards its 

 range extends to the valley of the Volga. In Scotland this bird is 

 resident in the counties of Moray, Ross, Inverness, Elgin, and Banff, 

 amid the fir- woods of the Spey valley, and also occurs in Aberdeenshire, 



MOUNTED IN THE ROWLAND W«HO STUDIOS 



CKESTKD TITMOUSK 



