Tufted Titmice are adorable with their chickadee-like antics and their big black eyes.
I was pretty sure a Tufted Titmouse spent the winter in our neighborhood last year, but this year I know it for sure because he came regularly to my feeders for peanuts. When he wasn’t visible, I could usually hear him singing his little peter-peter-peter song. In fact he was one of the few birds that continued to call throughout the winter.
Last March I had to listen to more than 120 recorded bird songs before I could identify this strange new sound in our neighborhood. Now I hear it regularly and I smile every time (and right on cue the little guy just started singing as I was typing this).
According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s All About Birds website, in experiments Tufted Titmice always choose the largest seeds they can find when they forage. That would explain why my titmouse is now competing with the Blue Jays for the in-the-shell peanuts I set out on the platform feeders. It’s fun to watch him fly away with a morsel of food that’s almost as big as his head!