northeast-flora-and-fauna

On a warm winter day I saw some movement on a tree. It was difficult to see what it was because of its (small) size and camouflage plumage. It looked like a small bird that would climb up a tree, fly down to the base of the tree, and then climb it again taking a somewhat different route to the top. This happened a few times, making me think it might be a Brown Creeper , famous for this tree-foraging technique . And it was. Though there are other treecreepers in the world (mostly in Eurasia), there are no other treecreepers in North America. My field guide implies that their closest relatives around here are the nuthatches (like the White-breasted Nuthatch I've shown before), but there's some DNA evidence that suggests they're more closely related to wrens and gnatcatchers , with nuthatches moving to somewhat more distant relatives. When climbing up a tree, the speckled plumage that's visible to us blends in well with tree bark, reminding me of how well some owls can c...

Here's a White-breasted Nuthatch I met last summer. It and a few companions were in oak trees near the Duke Farms Haybarn. They are one of the few birds that will traverse down a tree headfirst. Their Red-breasted Nuthatch cousins will also do this, but their Brown Creeper cousins tend to face upwards when climbing trees. While their Red-breasted Nuthatch cousins are one of the few non-woodpeckers that'll peck a hole into a tree to create a nest, the White-breasted Nuthatch isn't as hardcore and will only expand a tree cavity that already exists. The name "nuthatch" comes from the birds wedging acorns and softer nuts into a tree, and then using their beaks to break (or "hatch") the nut.  September 2, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 238962465, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)