I have a little microphone and speaker set-up that allows me to listen to the birds and chattering critters when my windows are closed. It really helps me battle cabin fever both during winter when it’s too cold to open the windows and in summer during hot spells when I have the a/c on for days at a time.
For the last several days I’ve been hearing what I thought was a Black-capped Chickadee murmuring in the shrub by the window in my office, but when I finally looked outside, I saw this little guy. I forgot that a Tufted Titmouse has a particular call that very closely resembles a chickadee’s.
My little friend spent quite a bit of time eating snow that had collected between some branches.
Then he sat in in shrub for about 10 minutes and chattered away:
I love those jet-black eyes:
