Black-headed and brown-headed chickadee: photos and facts. Brown-headed Chickadee

The brown-headed chickadee, or chickadee, is a true taiga bird. It has a huge range. It occupies forested areas of Europe (except for its southern Mediterranean regions). In our country, the brown-headed tit lives everywhere in the forest zone. She gets to sea coasts Chukotka, inhabits almost all of North America. The isolated focus of the species is confined to mountainous areas Central Asia, including Tibet.

K. Linnaeus on Latin assigned this chickadee the name black-headed, but then the marsh chickadee began to be called that, and because of this, a lot of confusion arose. To eliminate it, the chubby bird was given a new Latin name - “mountain tit.” This species included all European and our subspecies. The mountain origin of the chickadee and its closest ancestors can be assumed based on its close connection with two subspecies, which are now distinguished as independent species - with the Djungarian and Tibetan, or East China, chickadees.

During nesting, the puffball willingly colonizes both deciduous and coniferous forests, although, like the black-headed chickadee, it nests mainly in hollows deciduous trees(alder, aspen, less often birch). Many researchers note the attraction of puff grass to conifers, especially spruce forests. It also has another difference from the more southern and heat-loving black-headed chickadee - the chickadee extremely rarely nests in gardens and parks.

In the conditions of the Moscow region, the true territorial song of the puffball should be called its usual “ti” song. This song comes in two main types: monotonous “tee-tee-tie” sounds and sharper modulated ones, which can be rendered as “tie-tie-tie...”. The monotony of these songs across the vast expanses of the range is surprising.

Like the black-headed chickadee, chickadees remain faithful to each other in pairs for a long time, sometimes for the rest of their lives. They often lead a sedentary rather than a nomadic lifestyle. This is also indicated by the clearly expressed desire for situational and seasonal food storage.

The usual "ty" songs of brown-headed chickadees can be heard occasionally in December and January. The song of brown-headed chickadees is most regularly heard in March - April. In May and June, singing activity decreases sharply and may increase again by the time the chicks leave the nest. Both males and females can sing with the puffball. But female singing appears to be a relatively rare occurrence. St. Petersburg researchers noted that female plumes sing more often during the period of feeding the brood and leading the chicks.

Powderwings nest in hollows and almost always hollow out and pluck them themselves in rotten wood of alder, aspen or birch. They often make hollows in rotten stumps low above the ground or in rotten broken tree trunks. They rarely use someone else’s hollow, but then they must clean it and deepen it. Construction of the hollow along with the nest lasts from 8 to 25 days. The diameter of the hole is very small, 25-35 mm. The depth of the hollow is from 100 to 200 mm, less often deeper. The base of the nest consists of pieces of wood, bast, sometimes moss and wool. The tray is made of more delicate wool (squirrel or hare wool), often with a small admixture of feathers and cobwebs. There are often cases when there is almost no lining and at the bottom of the hollow lies only wood dust, chips of rotten wood and pieces of pine bark, sometimes strips of juniper, aspen, and hazel bast. IN artificial nests puffballs rarely settle. Known nests in unusual places- under the roots of trees, in old thrush nests, in crevice half-hollows and in niches made by yellow wood. A.S. Malchevsky and A.V. Bardin believe that, despite specialization (hollowing out hollows), puffy birds still retain elements of behavior characteristic of the entire group of tits, characterized by a very high nesting polymorphism. It is interesting that, according to the observations of the same authors, each pair first lays several hollows in different places and hollows them out one by one, but then concentrates on hollowing one. E.S. Ptushenko insisted that both partners participate in hollowing out the hollow of the puffy. A.S. Malchevsky, Yu.B. Pukinskny and A.V. Bardin indicate that both birds hollow out the hollow, but only the female builds the nest. V.I. Osmolovskaya and A.N. The Formozans noted that puffy birds often pluck out their nesting hollows just under the bark and the outer wall of the hollow is then easily dented with a finger. Making a nest usually takes 4-6, sometimes 3 or even 2 days.

A full clutch (from mid-April to mid-May) of 7-8 white eggs with reddish-brown spots is incubated only by the female from the moment the penultimate egg is laid for 13-14 days. During incubation, the male regularly feeds the female, first outside the hollow, and then in the hollow. Hatching lasts for 1-2, sometimes 3 days. Occasionally, the last chick hatches 3-5 days late. In the first 2-3 days after hatching, the female almost never flies out of the hollow - she incubates the remaining eggs and warms the chicks. The male brings food for the whole family. From the 3-4th day, the female begins to regularly feed the chicks along with the male. On average, there are 13-15 arrivals with food per hour. The size of the hunting area ranges from 5 to 12 thousand m2. According to the observations of E.S. Ptushenko and A.A Inozemtsev, in deciduous forests nesting areas are larger, in conifers - smaller. Feeding lasts 18-20 days. The parents feed young chickadees that fly out of the hollow for 7-10 days near the hollow. Submitted by A.V. Bardin, at the age of 26-27 days (5-6 days after departure) the chicks are already trying to get food on their own. The earliest disintegration of the brood was observed only 15 days after leaving the nest. The main enemy of the woodpecker during the nesting season is the great spotted woodpecker, which destroys about 25% of their nests.

The brown-headed chickadee is quite flexible in choosing places to collect food, but most of the food in all seasons for this species is obtained on the branches and needles of spruce and pine trees. This reveals the taiga character of the species. The basis of nutrition for nesting chicks is butterfly caterpillars, spiders, and their cocoons. The food of the chicks in the first days of their life consists exclusively of small caterpillars of butterflies, larvae of other insects and spiders. Starting from the age of three days, parents often bring small beetles, butterfly pupae, and hymenoptera to the chicks. Shortly before leaving the nest, the chicks begin to be fed with seeds, and the number of caterpillars and spiders decreases. The composition of the food of fledglings is similar to that of adult birds during the same period. In the diet of adult birds, homoptera (mainly psyllids), lepidoptera (usually only caterpillars), coleoptera or beetles (mainly weevils), hymenoptera (riders and sawflies), diptera (mosquitoes, flies), hemiptera (bugs), and sometimes earthworms and shellfish. Great value have seeds of spruce, pine and juniper, which puffballs readily eat not only in winter, but also in summer. In addition, the food of these chickadees contains fruits and seeds of rowan, blueberry, alder, birch, larch, cotoneaster, hops, cornflower, meadow cornflower, reed grass, horse sorrel, flax, oats, and wheat. In the spring, puffballs eat the anthers of aspen and alder and drink birch sap.

The brown-headed tit, like other tits, has a complex sound dictionary. It is based on whistling contact sounds, forming a special, complexly organized system of “qi” (“si”) signals. Slightly varying the speed of issuing signals ("qi", "cit", "si", "sit", "ti", "chit", etc.) allows you to very subtly reflect the dynamics of ongoing events. Acceleration of shouts or their increase in frequency is an increase in danger, irritation or anxiety, slowdown is a weakening of anxiety.

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How to distinguish between puffball and black-headed chickadee

Confusion when identifying the type of chickadee is often observed. And no wonder. Firstly, chickadees are similar to each other, and secondly, in Russian they are called differently.

Puffy, aka brown-headed chickadee, gray chickadee, common chickadee.

Black-headed Chickadee- she’s a brown chickadee, she’s a chickadee.

Please note that the color brown appears in the names of both birds. The Latin name helps. Puffball - Parus montanus. Black-headed chickadee - Parus palustris.

The British named them radically differently: their chickadee is the willow tit, and the black-headed chickadee is the marsh tit. But they are also unhappy, since these names do not correspond “one hundred percent” to the true biotopes of these birds.

Chickadee (photo by Bob Tunstall) Black-headed Chickadee (photo by Steve Seal)

As can be seen from the above photos, lighting, photo processing, and filters used can noticeably change the color of the plumage. Therefore, color shades are poor assistants in photo identification. It should also be taken into account that Western morphs of chickadees have different general shades in plumage than Russian ones. Therefore, let’s put aside the tonal differences and turn to other features.

An article on how to differentiate between a chickadee and a black-headed chickadee was published by Brian Stretch (http://www.worcesterbirding.co.uk/49.html). The author immediately notes that one or even two signs in the plumage do not make it possible to accurately determine the type of chickadee. It is much safer to pay attention to general structure the body of the bird, in particular on the head and neck. Unlike the blackhead, the puffball itself hollows out a nesting hollow, which makes it clear why its neck is more powerful. General form The body of the puffy creature is egg-shaped, with a large rounded head. Its plumage looks sloppy due to the loose surface of down and feathers, while the black-headed chickadee looks neat, as if it has just been “laid down”. So - an egg-shaped and loose plump creature with a “bull” neck and a slender, as if “sleek”, black-headed chickadee.

Chickadee (photo - Peter Walkden) Black-headed Chickadee (photo - John Robinson)

The powder has an extended matte black cap, extending further onto the back than that of the black-headed chickadee, but this feature strongly depends on the posture of the bird. Further, the shape of the head and cap ensures that the powder is larger in size and degree of whiteness. cheeks, while the black-headed cheek is often two tones, with a beige tint at the back. But in some individuals of the blackhead they can be as white as those of the puffball. Sometimes the identification books note the shine of the black cap of the black-headed chickadee, but one must be careful with this sign: juveniles have no shine at all, and in low light it may not appear in adults either.

Another unreliable sign is the appearance of a small black bib under the beak. If it is wider towards the bottom and has a fuzzy border at the bottom, as if it was peppered with ground pepper, then it is most likely a powdery piece. While with a smaller bib, which expands little or not at all, and with a clear contour of the “doctor’s beard” below, it will be a black-headed chickadee. But, unfortunately, in some individuals these signs overlap.

The photo shows that they are white cheeks the powder is longer and even extends beyond the wing.

The upper parts of both birds are equally brownish, the shade being slightly darker on the wings. On the folded wing of the puffball, an extended pale light stripe, formed by the light edges of some feathers. But some birds in the summer with worn plumage may not have this sign. The fact that a black-headed chickadee may have the same light stripe on a fresh feather immediately after molting can add to the uncertainty.

The black-headed chickadee has a light marking at the base beak, which may extend along the cutting edge, but the powder does not have such a sign. In field conditions, this sign does not work at a distance, but up close it identifies the species well.

Chickadee (photo by Steve Seal) Black-headed Chickadee (photo by John Robinson)

Black-headed Chickadee (photo - John Robinson)

The most reliable identifier of chickadees in the field remains their voice - their songs are clearly distinguishable.

Pairs of these tits show amazing attachment to certain areas of the forest with an area of 10-20 hectares. Their whole life takes place in this limited territory, which they can cross in a matter of minutes. But they remember every tree here very well, they know where to find food, a place to sleep, silt and nests. Every day, flying from tree to tree, they slowly move around their area in search of food, walking a winding path of 3-5 kilometers.

Brown-headed chickadees have two songs, completely different from each other. The so-called whistling song is a series of loud, beautiful whistles: “tiu-tiu-tiu-tiu.” Each bird uses several of its variations, differing in height and tempo of execution. This song can be heard already in the first sunny days winter, at the end of December. But most of all it attracts attention in March, when there are still few other singing birds. Together with bullfinches, pikas, kinglets and great tits, puffy birds create the sound background of a forest that has just awakened in spring.

The second song of the puffball - gurgling - is quite quiet and consists of alternating trills: “si-sisi-sisisi-tyur-r-lyu-lu-lyu...” Not only male puffballs sing, but also females. The whistling song is most often used to attract a female and maintain communication between partners. The gurgling sound serves as a sign that the individual has a territory and is going to nest here. Males sing a special quiet version of the gurgling song when courting females.

When the forest is filled with the noise of spring streams, and flowers bloom on their banks yellow flowers coltsfoot, puffy ducks begin to look for a place for a nest. Like all tits, they nest in hollows. However, unlike other European tits, plume tits, as well as tufted tits, prefer to hollow out the hollow themselves. Living trunks are too strong for their small beaks. Therefore, they choose stumps and dead trees with soft, rotten wood for hollows. The male and female take turns flying up to the tree and quickly nipping at the rotten wood. Having collected as many pieces as possible into its beak, one bird flies off to the side, and another bird takes its place without hesitation. When making a hollow, puffballs do not throw wood chips directly under it - after all, those chips, brightly whitening on the forest floor, can give away the location of the nest. They fly away with pieces of wood and often not just throw them away, but hide them between the needles, behind loose bark, in holes where the knots have fallen out.

The shape of the finished hollow is variable and depends on the location of the soft and hard areas of the wood. And when strong twigs force the chubby ones to make a very intricate move into the hollow. Most often, the depth of the hollow is 14-16, and the diameter of the bottom is 7-8 centimeters. The nests of brown-headed chickadees differ well from the nests of other tits - they have no moss. This is a rather careless lining of strips of juniper bast, aspen, hazel, pine bark scales, wool and feathers. Like all tits, the nest is built by the female alone, and the male accompanies her on flights for building material.

Along with woodpeckers, puffy woodpeckers are suppliers of hollows for other small birds - cavity nesters, since they make a new hollow every year. They are especially often occupied by pied flycatchers. Sometimes they unceremoniously drive out chicks even from new hollows, forcing them to abandon eggs or small chicks.

Chickadees begin laying eggs later than other tits, in early May. The female spends the night in the nest, where the male accompanies her every evening. In the morning, he flies up to the hollow again and calls his girlfriend with a quiet song. Every morning, before leaving the nest, the female lays one white egg with brown specks. The birds spend the whole day together. The female often begs for food from the male, at this moment reminiscent of a fledgling chick asking for food. And she screams like a chick: “si-ti-zhe.” The male from time to time gives her the food he finds, which is very important for the female during the period of intensive development of her eggs, each of which weighs about 1.2 grams and is approximately a tenth of the body weight of an adult bird. In the first half of the day, the female returns to the nest several times, bringing tufts of wool and dry blades of grass to cover the unfinished clutch.

The first two days after the birth of the offspring, the female spends most of the day in the hollow, warming the almost naked babies with sparse fluff on the head, shoulders and back. There are usually seven or eight chicks. It is mainly the male who obtains food for the whole family. Then the female increasingly leaves the nest and participates in feeding the chicks along with the male.

Brown-headed chickadees feed their chicks often - 300-500 times a day. The food consists mainly of spiders, caterpillars and sawfly larvae. They bring them eggshells, lumps of earth, shells of terrestrial mollusks. Over the entire period of nesting life (about 19 days), approximately 20-30 thousand (800 grams) of various invertebrate animals disappear in the yellow mouths of the chicks.

The chicks leave the nests already able to fly well. As a rule, this happens early in the morning. The chicks peer through the entrance hole into a new world for a long time, until the first one suddenly decides to fly. The rest fly out after him and never return to the nest. Excited parents often scream and sing a whistling song. They accompany each chick on its first flight to the place where it lands, and immediately feed it.

For a long time, these birds belonged to the genus of tits, but recently they were separated into a separate genus - chickadees. There are several representatives of this genus, but the two most commonly found are the brown-headed chickadee and the black-headed chickadee.

Both species have striking features and signs that make them easy to recognize, but at first glance it will be difficult for an uninitiated person to distinguish them.

Description of species: black-headed and brown-headed chickadee

Brown-headed and black-headed chickadees are very similar: they have fluffy gray-brown plumage, reach 14 centimeters in length, the maximum wingspan reaches 22 centimeters, weight does not exceed 14 grams, a very short neck and a large head, the cheeks and neck on the sides are light, almost white. The underparts are off-white, the beak is brown-black, and the legs are gray.

The black-headed chickadee was first described in 1758, the brown-headed chickadee in 1827, and it was from this year that their full study began, as well as the search for the main differences and features characteristic of each species.

Brown-headed chickadees are one of the most common species; they received their second name, puffy chickadee, because they bad weather feathers fluff up a lot. They have a matte black cap on the head and back of the head, and there is a spot of the same color on the front of the throat. Brown-headed chickadees are more curious than other representatives of this species.

In black-headed chickadees, the cap is not matte, but shiny, and the spot on the neck is much smaller in size. Notable features of black-headed chickadees include more long tail and a smaller head, as well as greater mobility, they even fly and sing faster.

Vocal abilities of chickadees

At a distance, these two species of birds can be distinguished by their vocalizations; brown-headed chickadees have only three types of songs in their repertoire: territorial, demonstrative and for courting a female. The first and last ones are most often used by the male, and the demonstrative one can be heard from both the male and the female during the period of searching for a partner.

The vocal repertoire of black-headed chickadees is very diverse. They make both regular screaming sounds and those intended for specific purposes: courtship, protecting the nest by the female, defending the territory by the male, flirting, and so on. Each type of song usually has about 20 variations.

Bird's habitat

These birds live in the northern regions North America, Europe and Asia and lead settled life- these are one of the few representatives of birds that store food for the winter and migrate only as a last resort - to search for food in early spring or cold winter.

Throughout their lives, chickadees live in a territory of about 5 kilometers - this small territory is chosen during the bird’s first nesting and is fixed in its memory for the rest of its life. This small area is ideally explored for building nests, searching for food and shelters.

The habitats of brown-headed and black-headed chickadees are somewhat different. The brown-headed one loves coniferous, dense forests; it can easily be found in the taiga or on the banks of rivers overgrown with bushes, where it is almost impossible to meet a person.

Blackheads are often found near villages, cities, towns, but the most suitable for them are deciduous trees or, in extreme cases, mixed forests. Preference is given to low-lying and flat areas with swampy stands where there are many dead trees.

In their range common habitat Black-headed chickadees always dominate over brown-headed chickadees and do not tolerate brown-headed fellows on their territory, although sometimes they make exceptions for their lone representatives in winter.

What do these bird species eat?

All types of chickadees feed approximately the same: the main food includes seeds of various plants (for example, juniper and sunflower), tree fruits, small nuts, insects (beetles, larvae, etc.). Due to the fact that their diet includes harmful bugs, chickadees are considered natural healers who help forestry.

In summer they eat plant and animal food, and in winter and spring they eat mainly plant food. Early spring black-headed chickadees drink the sap of birch, aspen and maple, and in winter they visit feeders located near farmland (although they visit them quite rarely) and, most interestingly, hide the grains found in the feeders in the forest.

Chicks of both species in the first days of life eat exclusively animal food and only over time plant food begins to be included in the diet. The tendency to be thrifty in chickadees appears very early - already at the age of one month. Throughout spring, summer and autumn, birds make continuous reserves for the winter.

In the spring, they store pine and spruce seeds; in the fall, chickadees hide various insects and plant seeds. During the period from spring to winter, one bird makes up to 5 kg of reserves in its habitat (in the bark of trees, cones and other secluded places), although only a third of it is eaten in one winter (quite a lot of reserves are simply lost).

Socket device

The brown-headed chickadee nests from April to May, and the black-headed chickadee from the end of March. During these periods, the chickadees are very excited, sing a lot, fly, fight for females, and look for a place to nest. Couples last until one of the partners dies.

During the first year of life, young birds look for a mate in the area nearby their home. If a partner has not been found, they leave these places and seek luck in distant areas of the forest.

In the first year of life, out of 1000 individuals, only 300 survive; about 50 birds survive to 5 years, and 3 to 6-7 years, although at home these birds often live up to 9 years.

Nesting of adult birds occurs in approximately one place, on certain territory, which the male guards for a whole year. Brown-headed chickadees often make new nests; black-headed chickadees prefer to use old or other people's hollows.

To make a new hollow, the birds pinch off wood and take it away so as not to give away the location of the nest. Hollows are made in dead or uprooted trees, since living wood is too hard for the fragile and small beak of a chickadee.

Before populating the hollow, it is cleaned and deepened to update it and make it more suitable for the nest. Usually certain types of trees are selected, these include alder, larch, birch, and aspen. It takes up to 12 days to make a new hollow or update an old one. The depth should be about 20 cm.

To build a nest different types chickadees use certain materials. Thus, blackheads use moss, wool, cobwebs, feathers, and brownheads use twigs, bark, feathers, wool, and birch bark.

Caring for chicks

Brown-headed chickadees begin laying eggs from the end of May, and black-headed chickadees from the end of March; in one clutch there are up to 9 white eggs with red-brown specks. The size of one egg is approximately 15x12 mm.

For the first 15 days, the female incubates the eggs without leaving the nest, and the male feeds and protects her. The female can leave the nest only in rare cases, if there is no male for a long time to find food for herself. Already in April - May, chicks of black-headed chickadees appear, and in July - brown-headed chickades.

The female and male feed them together, constantly bringing them food. In cold weather, the female stays in the nest with the chicks, warming them, and in warm weather she can leave to get food.

After 18 days, the chicks are able to fly, but still do not know how to get their own food. Over the next 12 days, the male and female teach them how to get food, navigate the terrain, and find a nest.

Throughout their lives, they breed and nurse more than one offspring, carefully caring for them until the chicks are able to survive independently in the wild forest. The life of chickadees is complex and unpredictable; from a large seasonal brood of chicks, only the strongest, those best adapted to the wild survive, and, alas, they are few in number.

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Brown-headed Chickadee BIRD OF THE YEAR 2017

Neverova N.F. - biology teacher of MBOU secondary school No. 17

city of Dimitrovgrad, Ulyanovsk region.

Dear friends!

Happy New Year!

May all your most cherished wishes come true this year, may the year be peaceful, successful and prosperous!

And if any trouble happens, let us wish each other not to lose heart, just as a chubby man never loses heart in the most severe winter frosts.

Happy New Year 2017, the year of the plump and the rooster!

Russian Bird Conservation Union

Brown-headed Chickadee – Bird of the Year 2017

2016 is over, and the title of bird of the year is moving from the bright and flashy hoopoe to the humble brown-headed chickadee, or puffy chickadee.

What did this little bird do to deserve such an honor?

Despite its fragile build, it can be a symbol of successfully confronting difficulties: this small bird winters not only in middle lane European Russia, but also in Yakutia, at the “Pole of Cold”, where frosts down to minus 50 degrees are not uncommon. Harsh winters The brown-headed chickadee is saved by food reserves created in warm weather. Ornithologists have calculated that from spring to autumn, one chickadee stores up to 15 kg of winter reserves (mainly spruce seeds) in secluded places - about half a million food items. To successfully overwinter, 300,000 such objects are enough, but instinct tells you to play it safe - some of the reserves will not be found in winter.

This bird received the popular name “puffy” because in the cold it fluffs up its plumage, turning into a plump, loose ball. The brown-headed tit is a typical forest dweller; in cities it can only be found in forest parks.

Inexorable statistics show that in the first year of life, out of 1000 chickadees, only a third survive, about 50 birds manage to survive to 5 years, and only three to 6-7 years. The maximum known lifespan of a puffball is 9 years.

The breeding season begins in April - May, with flight chicks appearing in July. The nest is made in a rotten trunk or stump of a dead tree (usually birch, aspen, alder, larch) at a height of up to 3 m above the ground. Like the tufted tit, the brown-headed tit prefers to hollow out (or rather pluck out) the nest on its own, but if that fails, it can use ready-made natural voids or old nests of tufted tits, lesser spotted woodpeckers, or its own, having previously deepened and cleaned the hollow.

REPRODUCTION

Basic building material- pieces of bark, birch bark, strips of soaked bast, sometimes wool and small quantity feathers After construction is completed, a break is taken for 1-5 days. Clutch of 5-9 eggs, with rare exceptions once a year. The eggs are white with reddish-brown spots and speckles, often thicker at the blunt end. Egg dimensions: (15-16) x (12-13) mm. The female incubates for 13-15 days, while the male feeds her and guards the territory. Sometimes the female leaves the nest and gets food for herself.

Chicks hatch asynchronously, usually over the course of two or three days.

NUTRITION

It feeds on small invertebrates and their larvae, as well as seeds and fruits. In summer, the diet of adult birds is divided approximately equally between animal and plant foods, and in winter up to three quarters consists of food plant origin, mainly seeds coniferous trees- pine, spruce and juniper.

The fact is that the brown-headed chickadee reacts more sharply than all hollow-nesting birds to a picnic holiday with bonfires (since in this situation, the small dry trees it needs for nesting are cut down first). The brown-headed chickadee disappears from forests in which sanitary felling was carried out after drainage work, and does not tolerate park landscaping carried out in its habitat.

In 2017, declared in Russia the Year of Specially Protected natural areas and the Year of Ecology, caring for the brown-headed tit will help us all not only to form the ecological culture of the population, but to preserve the world around us for people and birds.

LET'S FIND THE BEAK OF THE BROWN-HEADED CHICKEN

nuthatch

WE WILL ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS

What does the brown-headed chickadee eat?
Why it deserves the title "Bird of the Year"
Did you like the brown-headed chickadee? What exactly?

Tit family (Paridae)

Other species in this family:

Black-headed Chickadee

Tufted tit

Moskovka

Blue tit

Great tit

Black-headed Chickadee

The chickadee is very similar to the black-headed chickadee, differs from it in its voice and some coloring features: the “cap” on the back of the head extends further to the neck and is matte, not shiny; black spot under the beak it is wider and resembles a “bib”; there is a light area on the wing formed by the light edges of the secondary flight feathers. There is no sexual dimorphism.

The chubby bird's song is a repeating sequence of gentle and sad sounds; more typical is a ringing, slightly nasal call (usually expressed in the syllables: “tsitsi-dzhee-dzhee”), which the bird uses very often.