The Coal Titmouse
 Morris's British Birds 1891
 Scanned by www.BirdCheck.co.uk
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Coal Tit mouse
Image Title: Coal Tit mouse
Description: Coal Tit (Parus ater)

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COLE TITMOUSE.
Y BENLOYN LYGLIW, IN ANCIENT BRITISH. COLEMOUSE.
Parus ater, PENNANT. MONTAGU. Parus atricapillus, BRISSON. Parus—A contraction of Parvus—Little ? Ater—Black.

The Cole or Coal Titmouse is dispersed over Europe, and occurs in North America, and the northern parts of Asia, as well as in the Crimea, Palestine, and elsewhere; it is also found in Japan, according to M. Temminck. It suits itself to the genial climate of Italy and severe Siberia, and inhabits alike Russia, Germany, Norway, Finland, Turkey, Sicily, Greece, Sweden, and France.
The Cole Titmouse is to be met with in every part of England— north, east, south, and west. It is by no means rare, and yet can hardly be said to be an abundant species. In Yorkshire it occurs in wooded districts. In the immediate neighbourhood of London it is not uncommon, and has even been seen in the great metropolis itself, but doubtless only 'en passant.' Mr. Edward has observed it in the neighbourhood of Banff; Mr. Thompson about Aberarder, Invernesshire; and Mr. St. John in Sutherlandshire, in plenty, as also at Wick; in fact, in Scotland it is a very abundant species in all the pine and fir woods; birch, oak, and alder it is also partial to. In Ireland it has been observed in the counties of Donegal, Clare, Kerry, Cork, Tipperary,Wexford, and Dublin, and therefore there is no doubt but that it may at times be met with in every part of the 'Sister Island.' It is there more numerous than the Marsh Titmouse, the reverse being the case in England.
This neat little bird abides with us throughout the year, but is seen more abundantly in the winter, in consequence of partial migrations.
Though this species may be observed on almost any or every tree at times, the Scotch fir seems to be that in which it is most at home. It is of an apparently restless disposition, moving like 'Young Rapid,' from place to place, from hedge to hedge, from tree to tree, from wood to wood, from district to district. It is addicted to woods, as supplying its food, but I have met with it in ordinary cultivated districts, plantations, gardens, etc. It frequently seeks its food on the ground.
It is more shy than the preceding species or the Blue-cap. I copy the following life-like description of this interesting little bird and its associates, from Mr. Macgillivray; its truthfulness I can fully attest:— 'It is pleasant to follow a troop of these tiny creatures, as they search the tree tops, spreading all round, fluttering and creeping among the branches, ever in motion, now clinging to a twig in an inverted position, now hovering over a tuft of leaves, picking in a crevice of the bark, searching all the branches, sometimes visiting the lowermost, and again winding among those at the very tops of the trees. In wandering among these woods you are attracted by their shrill cheeping notes, which they continually emit as they flutter among the branches, and few persons thus falling in with a flock, can help standing still to watch their motions for a while.' It is also observable how suddenly, without any apparent cause, the whole troop, as if under marching orders, decamp in a body from a tree, and halt elsewhere, again to go through their exercises, evolutions, and manoeuvres.
Its flight is short and unsteady, produced by a continual flutter.
The food of the Cole Titmouse consists of insects, worms, caterpillars, and seeds. In search of the first-named it will pick with extreme rapidity all round in a circle, without so much as disturbing a single 'sere and yellow leaf,' though perched on the centre of its under side. It is said to be particularly fond of the berries of the woodbine, and to hold any hard seed with its feet against a branch, and peck at it till it obtains the kernel. The same with the seeds of the thistle, on which I have watched one alight and hang on the plant to pick off, and then fly up with to the bough of a neighbouring tree on which it hammers it, with a loud tapping, to separate the down from the seed. In the winter it also feeds on wheat and oats, and appears to hoard up some portion of a superabundant supply of food against a day of scarcity. Occasionally it will pick a bone or other fragment, with much zest. Small fragments of stone are swallowed to help to triturate its food. It picks up oddments on the ground at times, seeds of fir and such like. Mr. Edward Blyth says in the 'Magazine of Natural History,' volume viii, page 336, note, 'I once, however, put a nest of young Goldcrests into a large cage containing several insectivorous birds, in the hope that one out of the number would have brought them up. A Cole Tit descended, seemed very much interested, and looked, I thought, as if he would have fed them; when, lo! he seized one of them by the neck, placed it between his claws, and began very deliberately to eat it. There is, therefore, a little of the Magpie even in this tiny delicate species.'
The note, which is first heard in February, is unmusical, and is rendered, by Meyer, by the syllables 'zit, zit,' and 'zit-tee,' 'che-chee, che-chee' may also serve to express it. In the spring it is very loud, and may be heard nearly as far as that of the Oxeye: suspended for the most part until August, it is then renewed. When the female is sitting, at least towards the end of her confinement, she hisses at any approaching enemy, and will also bite if molested. Mr. Knapp says of this species and the Oxeye, that 'they will often acquire or compound a note, become delighted with it, and repeat it incessantly for an hour or so, and then seem to forget, or be weary of it, and we hear it no more."
At the beginning of winter, when the plumage is new, all the feathers of the back are tipped with brownish yellow, which wears off into bluish grey in summer, and those on the lower part of the front of the neck, from being tipped with white, turn altogether black.
The nest is placed in a hole of a tree, and according to Mr. Hewitson, at a less height from the ground than that of the other Titmice, even in the hollows about the roots; sometimes in a hole of a, wall, or of a bank, quite close to, or even on the ground, or in that of a mouse, rat, or mole; one was thus; found in a bank at Swinhope, Lincolnshire, by my friend the Rev. R. P. Alington. It is made up of moss, wool, hair, fur, and feathers. This bird, like the Oxeye, and doubtless others of its race, will enlarge a hole for its accommodation by removing the pulverized particles of wood which have partially filled or lined it.
The eggs, from six to eight in number, are like those of its fellows —white, spotted or speckled, but seldom blotted, with light red.
Incubation lasts about a fortnight, the male and female sitting by turns: the young are fed principally with caterpillars. Two broods are hatched in the year, of which the first is fledged in May.
Male: weight, about two drachms and a quarter; length, four inches and a quarter; bill, blackish or dark horn-colour, lighter at the edges and tip; iris, dusky; head, white on the sides, black glossed with blue on the crown; neck, white on the sides, black near the wing, with an oblong patch of white. Chin and throat, black; breast, dull white in the middle; below, and on the sides, light buff with a tinge of green; back, bluish grey above, verging to brownish buff: the feathers are singularly long, as is the case with most of the other Titmice.
The wings, underneath, grey; they expand to the width of seven inches and a third; greater and lesser wing coverts, bluish grey, the feathers tipped with white, forming two bars across the wings; primaries, brownish grey, edged with greenish grey on the outside, and on the inside with greyish white; the first feather is very short, the second shorter than the third, and equal to the seventh; the third, fourth, and fifth, of nearly equal length, and the longest in the wing; secondaries, the same; tertiaries, the same, tipped with dull white. The tail, which is slightly indented at the end, and extends a little beyond the wings, is brownish grey, the feathers margined with greenish, underneath grey with white shafts; upper and under tail coverts, greenish buff; legs, toes, and claws, very dark lead-colour; the latter are rather thick.
The female resembles the male. The black on the head is less glossy, and does not extend so far down, and the white is less pure: the grey of the back is tinged with greenish brown.
The young resemble the female: the first feathers have a tinge of green.
A variety is described in the 'Zoologist,' page 3055, by the Rev. Francis K. Amherst, in which 'the white mark on the nape of the neck was continued in a broad and well-defined line, over the crown of the head to the upper mandible.' Mr. W. P. Cocks also one, shot near Falmouth, which had a broad white crest from the forehead to the nape of the neck; and the Rev. R. Wilton has told me of another which had a single white feather in the tail. Another has been known with the head, neck, and part of the back and breast white, slightly marked with black spots.

"There comes a saucy Tom-tit, and says a word or so."
ANNETTE P. C KNIGHT.

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