Bridled Titmouse

Baeolophus wollweberi

Order PASSERIFORMES - Family PARIDAE

Menu

1. Cool Facts
2. Description
3. Similar Species
4. Sound
5. Range
6. Habitat
7. Food
8. Behavior
9. Reproduction
10. Conservation Status
11. Other Names

The most strikingly marked of the American titmice and chickadees, the Bridled Titmouse has a black bib and a white-and-black patterned face. Primarily a Mexican species, its range reaches the United States only in the southern mountains of Arizona and New Mexico.

Cool Facts

• Unlike many members of its family, the Bridled Titmouse appears not to hide food for later use. The region of the brain related to memory of spatial location, the hippocampus, is small in this species compared with other species that frequently hide food.

• The Bridled Titmouse is the only North American member of its family that appears to have helpers at the nest regularly. The identity and sex of the extra birds attending nests is not yet known.

• The Bridled Titmouse closely resembles the Crested Tit of Eurasia. Genetic studies show, however, that it is closely related to the other North American titmice.

Description

• Size: 10 cm (4 in)
• Weight: 10 g (0.35 ounces)

• Small songbird.
• Crest on head is gray bordered with black and white.
• Black-and-white face.

• White face with black eyeline curving up behind eye, and then extending back down to join the small black bib.
• Back and tail gray.
• Underparts grayish white.

Sex Differences

Sexes alike.

Immature

Juvenile similar to adult.

Similar Species

• No other bird has a black-and-white face and a crest.
• The crestless Mountain Chickadee has a white eyestripe, but it does not connect with the bib. No other titmouse has a black bib.

Sound

Song a series of repeated whistled notes, "peeta-peeta-peeta." Call a low, harsh "tsi-tsi-tsi-di-di-di-di."

»listen to songs of this species

Range

Summer Range

Resident from southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico southward through mountains of Mexico to southern Mexico.

Habitat

Montane oak and mixed oak-pine-juniper woodlands. Also in some riparian habitats.

Food

Insects and acorns.

Behavior

Foraging

Gleans insects from leaves and twigs. Hangs upside down to reach insects. Travels with mixed species foraging flocks. Holds food under feet to peck it.

Reproduction

Nest Type

Nests in cavities in trees; often in nestboxes. Nest is a cup of grass, cottonwood down, flowers, fur, and cocoons, lined with soft fibers.

Egg Description

White, unmarked.

Clutch Size

4-8 eggs.

Condition at Hatching

Helpless and naked.

Conservation Status

Limited range in United States makes populations there uncertain. In Mexico, it is vulnerable to the loss of oak woodlands, but the species is widespread.

Other Names

Mésange Arlequin (French)
Herrelillo enmascarado (Spanish)

Sources used to construct this page:

Nocedal, J., and M. S. Ficken. 1998. Bridled Titmouse (Baeolophus wollweberi).In The Birds of North America, No. 375 (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Birds of North America, Inc., Philadelphia, PA.