i 3 4 THE BIRDS OF THE WOODS 



and Switzerland, where it assembles in flocks among the river-banks, forest outskirts, 

 and gardens. It is resident in Greece, but rare in southern Europe generally. Some 

 winter in central Europe, and associate with other tits ; others migrate from 

 September to November to return in March and April. The nest of the long- 

 tailed tit is frequently built in a tree about 10 feet from the ground, with one 

 side resting against the main trunk to which it is fastened, while the bottom is 

 supported on a mossy branch or in the fork of two branches. It is neatly and 

 skilfully made of moss and cobwebs, oval and domed, with a small entrance-hole 

 high up on the side carefully concealed by feathers ; the outer surface being covered 

 with lichens, and the interior lined with small feathers, of which so many as two 

 thousand have been counted in a single nest. This tit lives exclusively on 

 small insects and their larvae ; and in not holding its food between its toes, as well 

 as in several other respects, differs in habits from all other tits. Untiring in 

 activity, the male tit never remains long on the same tree, but wanders through its 

 beat several times a day, followed in autumn by its wife and family in single file. 

 The somewhat insignificant song of this bird consists of a short series of monotonous 

 chirps, ending with a rather melodious note. Although, including its tail, it is 5^ 

 inches in length, the body is really no longer than that of a wren. The loosely 

 growing feathers are principally black and white ; the tail being black, with the 

 exception of the three outer feathers, which are white along their outer webs and 

 also tipped with white. 



Resembling the tits in some ways, and the woodpeckers in 

 Nuthatch. , Ti-i! t^ • i «■ 



others, the nuthatches include two European species ; namely, oitta 



ccesia, ranging across central Europe from the British Isles to Palestine, and 

 S. europcea, which replaces it in Scandinavia and Siberia, and ranges east- 

 wards to Japan. The nuthatch dwells in woods of all kinds, both small and 

 large, as well as in parks and gardens, but is most at home in a forest of deciduous 

 trees. Clumsy as it looks, it is really a singularly quick and active bird, which 

 will ascend to the very top of the highest trees, and descend with restless 

 activity all round the branches as if it were a mouse, its head now downwards, 

 now upwards, and often hanging on twigs like a tit and running along their 

 under side. The nuthatch can be occasionally observed resting by perching 

 across a bough like any other singing bird as it gives its loud call-note, which 

 resembles fetch-it quickly echoed. In colour the male is of a slaty-blue 

 above with a black eye-stripe passing from the base of the beak to the nape; 

 the wings are slaty-blue like the back and so is the tail, but the outer tail- 

 feathers are edged with white which only shows when the tail is spread ; the 

 under-parts are very pale buff, and the flanks are chestnut. Beech-mast is its 

 favourite food, but it also eats sunflower and other seeds, and lives largely 

 on insects, for which it taps the trees as if it were a woodpecker, and also 

 seeks them on the ground. It takes its name from its habit of fixing hazel- 

 nuts into a crack in a tree, and then hammering them open with its beak ; 

 and it establishes little stores of these nuts. Its way of nesting is remark- 

 able ; it appropriates a hole in a wall, or in a decayed tree, and, if in a tree, 

 sticks so much clay round the mouth that only a very small aperture, just 



