RED-BELLIED, BLACK-CAPPED NUTHATCH. 4I 



KED-BELLIED, BLACK-CAPPED NUTHATCH. 



(Sitta varia.) 



Plate II. — Fig. 4. 



Sitta varia, Bart. p. 289. — Sitta Canadensis, Turton. — Small Nuthatch, 

 Lath. i. 651. 



SITTA CANADENSIS— Linkmvs. 



Sitta Canadensis, Bonap. Synop. p. 96. 



This bird is much smaller than the last, measuring only four 

 inches and a half in length, and eight inches in extent. In 

 the form of its bill, tongne, nostrils, and in the colour of the 

 back and tail-feathers, it exactly agrees with the former ; the 

 secondaries are not relieved with the deep black of the other 

 species; and the legs, feet, and claws are of a dusky greenish 

 yellow ; the upper part of the head is black, bounded by a 

 stripe of white passing round the frontlet ; a line of black 

 passes through the eye to the shoulder; below this is another 

 line of white ; the chin is white ; the other under parts a light 

 rust colour, the primaries and whole wings a dusky lead colour. 

 The breast and belly of the female are not of so deep a brown, 

 and the top of the head is less intensely black. 



This species is migratory, passing from the north, where 

 they breed, to the southern States, in October, and returning 

 in April. Its voice is sharper, and its motions much quicker, 

 than those of the other, being so rapid, restless, and small, as 

 to make it a difficult point to shoot one of them. When the 

 two species are in the woods together, they are easily distin- 

 guished by their voices, the note of the least being nearly an 

 octave sharper than that of its companion, and repeated more 

 hurriedly. In other respects, their notes are alike unmusical 

 and monotonous. Approaching so near to each other in their 

 colours and general habits, it is probable that their mode of 

 building, &c, may be also similar. 



Buffon's Torchepot de la Canada (Canada nuthatch of other 

 European writers) is either a young bird of the present species, 



