Gray-headed Chickadee

Poecile cinctusOrder: PASSERIFORMESFamily: Titmice and Chickadees (Paridae)

General

Gray-headed Chickadee: Medium-sized chickadee with gray-brown back, gray cap, black bib, white cheeks, and white underparts washed with buff-gray on sides and flanks. Wings and tail are gray with white-edged feathers. Sexes are similar.

Range and Habitat

Gray-headed Chickadee: North American range is restricted to central Alaska and far northwestern Canada. Lives primarily among scattered conifers and riparian willow and aspen thickets.

Listen to Call

Voice Text

"dee deer"

Interesting Facts

The Gray-Headed Chickadee is also known as the Siberian Tit.

It is the only member of the family Paridae common to the Old and New Worlds, occurring from Norway eastward across Eurasia into Alaska and arctic Canada.

Its vocalizations are remarkably complex and may hold a key to understanding the origin of song in songbirds.

A group of chickadees are collectively known as a "banditry" and a "dissimulation" of chickadees.

Author

Gary Owen Dick

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Bird Call Credits: The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Martyn Stewart, http://www.naturesound.org, Redmond, Washington USA. The reuse or copying of bird calls in this database is strictly forbidden.

Gray-headed Chickadee

Gray-headed Chickadee: Medium chickadee with gray-brown back, gray cap, black bib, white cheeks, and white underparts washed with buff-gray on sides and flanks. Wings and tail are gray with white-edged feathers. Formerly called the Siberian Tit, it is the hardiest of all chickadees.

● Song: "dee deer"

● Foraging & Feeding: Gray-headed Chickadee: Feeds on insects, spiders, food scraps, conifer seeds, and berries; forages in conifers and shrubs, gleaning insects from trunks, branches, and foliage.

● Breeding & nesting: Gray-headed Chickadee: Seven to nine white eggs marked with red brown, olive or gray, are laid in a nest made of grass, cottonwood down, flowers, fur, and cocoons, lined with grass, other vegetation, and animal fur, and built 4 to 28 feet above the ground in a deciduous tree, snag, or nest box. Incubation ranges from 13 to 16 days and is carried out by the female.

● Similar species: Gray-headed Chickadee: Boreal Chickadee has brown cap, back, and rump, lacks white edges on wing feathers, and has shorter tail. Black-capped Chickadee has black cap, gray back, and extensive white edges on wing feathers.

Flight Pattern

Short slow fluttering flights with rapid wing beats. May alternate quick wing beats with wings pulled to sides.

Gray-headed Chickadee Breeding Male Body Illustration

● Range & Habitat: Gray-headed Chickadee: North American range is restricted to central Alaska and far northwestern Canada. Lives primarily among scattered conifers and riparian willow and aspen thickets.

^BreedingMonogamous, Solitary nester

^PopulationRare

^MigrationNonmigratory

^Weight0.4 Ounces

Field Guide to Birds of North America