Yellow-headed kinglet bird. Lifestyle and habitat of the yellow-headed kinglet. What is remarkable about the wren bird? Everything you need to know about this songbird Where does the wren live?
There are 2 types kinglet birds- yellow-headed and red-headed. And today, we will tell you about the first of them, although the kings are not much different from each other, since it’s all about color. Let's start with the description and origin of the bird.
Description of the king
Yellow-headed Kinglet is a small songbird, distinguished by one of the most modest sizes of only 10-20 cm. Size is not the only feature, color, this is what, in addition to the voice of the king, is remembered the first time. The bird is colored gray-greenish with a bright yellow-golden flat on the head (red-headed birds have the same stripe only bright red), and the wings are painted with black, white and green patterns.
Of course, in appearance wren It looks like a “doughnut”, but in fact the bird is very mobile, constantly flying from branch to branch, or even from tree to tree. By the way, kings not only fans of singing, they actively use this method before breeding, luring the female. Wonderful singing can already be heard by the end of winter, although it does not last all year round, but until the end of summer.
Origin of the name king
There are several versions appearance of the kinglet:
1) Thanks to its stripe on the head, resembling a crown, the name of the bird appeared among the people
2) One fine day the birds staged a competition: whoever rises the highest is the winner. At first glance, the eagle took pride of place, but then a small bird flew out from under its wing, heading even higher! So the people affectionately called her “the king.”
HABITAT AND THE HAPPY-HEADED KING
What does the kinglet eat?
The main food of the king– invertebrates and various larvae. Of course, all kinds of caterpillars, aphids, beetles, grasshoppers, dipterans, mosquitoes and other insects are included in the diet. And if there is nothing to eat, then the seeds of coniferous trees come to the rescue.
Kings They get their food at the tops of trees, going down to the ground extremely rarely. Due to the fast metabolism, searching for food becomes the main activity of the day. Because in just 12 minutes of fasting, the bird not only loses 1/3 of its weight, but if it does not feed soon, it can die within an hour!
Where does the kinglet live?
Meet the king possible in Russia, the Caucasus, Siberia, the Far East and almost throughout Europe. The wren nests in coniferous or mixed forests in such a way that it cannot be seen from the ground. But in winter, the birds gather in groups together with tits and move in deciduous forests.
VIDEO: ABOUT THE KING IN THIS VIDEO, WE INVITE YOU TO WATCH AND LISTEN TO HOW THE KING SINGS
Species descriptions taken from Guide to birds and bird nests in central Russia(Bogolyubov A.S., Zhdanova O.V., Kravchenko M.V. Moscow, "Ecosystem", 2006).
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Imagine a frosty snowy forest. Tall spruces, snowdrifts, silence. Everything around seemed to have died out and frozen... And suddenly, at the very top of the tree, something began to stir.
With a high, barely audible squeak, the tiny creature flutters around in the spruce crown, looking for something, funnyly hanging upside down. The creature is so small that it can easily stand even on long pine needles! This is a yellow-headed wren. The proud name was given to the baby for the bright stripe on its head - the “crown”, orange-yellow in males and lemon-yellow in females. In, where the bird appears only in winter, it is called the “winter golden cockerel”, and in the past it was called the “carnation”.
The kinglet is very difficult to spot. And not only because it is very small, it is also perfectly camouflaged. The color, olive green above and light gray below, makes the bird completely invisible against the background of the branches. Only a bright spot on the head, bordered by a black stripe, stands out against the general background, but you can’t even see it from below. But the wren rarely descends to the ground; it feeds mainly in the crowns of coniferous trees. Only in winter and at the very beginning of spring, when everything from above has already been eaten or knocked down by the wind, do birds sometimes descend to the ground and look for prey under the leaves and in the snow.
EAT AND SING
Of course, large prey is too much for such a baby. He cannot even gouge or split it with his beak, as, for example, tits do, but only swallows it whole. What can such a baby swallow? A lot of things: aphids, springtails, small spider beetles, various larvae and insect eggs - everything is used. The wren collects food mainly at the ends of the branches of pine and spruce trees, examining secluded places between the needles, looking under the bark scales, into the smallest cracks and cracks. There are enough flying insects on the fly, hovering in the air like hummingbirds. During icy conditions or when there is a lack of animal food, birds sometimes swallow spruce and pine seeds. Such a small girl's metabolism is very fast; she cannot go hungry at all. So, in just 12 minutes of fasting, a yellow-headed kinglet can lose up to a third of its weight. Therefore, he eats almost continuously.
It is for this reason that it cannot be kept in captivity.
Almost as constantly as he eats, the male kinglet sings. His aria is a little reminiscent of a titmouse: the wren repeats the same three-syllable cries “tsi-fli-hii... tsi-fli-hii” 5-6 times, stretching out the last syllable, and ends with a short trill.
From mid-April to August, the entire breeding season, its rhythmic whistles and trills are heard. And some fanciers begin the singing season in February and end in September, and even in winter, little birds sometimes begin to hum quietly. But not everyone can hear them - the sounds of the king are so high that they are on the edge of the range that a person perceives.
BALL ON THE TREE
The yellow-headed wren is the smallest bird in Russia and Europe. Its tail is short, its head is large, turning immediately into a round body - not a bird, but a ball on thin tenacious legs. Of the seven species of kinglets, two live in Russia, but the range of the red-headed kinglet is much smaller. But yellow-headed kinglets have up to 12 subspecies, which differ in size, shades and intensity of plumage color.
Kinglets live in our forests almost sedentary. In winter, they usually do not stick to their nesting area and wander along with tits, nuthatches and other small birds. When there is no food, such migrations can take on the direction and character of a real flight, when flocks of “royal” birds move south, sometimes flying up to a thousand kilometers. But this happens quite rarely; most of the kinglets spend the winter in the same place as the summer.
The kinglet definitely needs coniferous (preferably spruce) forests. In mixed or deciduous forests, this bird is found only during migrations, but still chooses spruce forests for nesting. Mixed forests are also suitable, but fir trees must grow there, because the wren builds its cozy nest precisely under the protection of the spruce paw. So the area of distribution of the wren almost completely coincides with the range of spruce.
TRY TO LOOK!
The nest is a special conversation. Few people managed to see it (by the way, this is why in most reference books about the nesting of the wren it is honestly written: “Apparently, it is nesting”). Firstly, it is as tiny as the bird itself - 9-10 cm in diameter. Secondly, a warm, reliable building, similar to a piece of moss, is not visible against the background of green branches. This miracle of bird architecture is suspended from the bottom of a shaggy spruce leg so that thin branches are woven into the walls of the nest. This entire structure is usually located no lower than 8-10 m above the ground.
NUMEROUS OFFSPRINGS
Construction work takes quite a long time, up to three weeks, and begins in mid-April - early May. It is at this time that friendly flocks of kinglets break up into pairs. It is mainly the male who builds, as befits a man. It firmly entangles moss, lichens and thin stems and fastens them with the web of caterpillars and spider cocoons, and lines the inside with hair and feathers.
The result is a soft, deep and very dense cup. There are usually 8-10 eggs in a nest. They are yellowish, with many small brown specks and sometimes black streaks. The female incubates them, and the partner diligently feeds her. After 15-17 days, the male also has to feed the hatched babies - naked babies in the first week of life are not able to maintain their temperature, and the female needs to constantly warm them. This is where you have to work hard: the male constantly flutters in the crown of the “domestic” spruce, delivering food to the family up to 300 times a day! The chicks sit in the nest very closely, sometimes in two tiers, on top of each other, and, growing up, they gradually stretch their native home, so the old nests of the kinglets easily fall apart.
The baby grows up quickly: after 20 days, the chicks begin to climb out of the cramped nest onto neighboring branches, and after a month they are already flying confidently. And the kinglets, after feeding their first children for a week, have second ones. Of course, in the very north of its range, a second clutch is not always possible, but even in the taiga, the “golden cockerel” manages to breed twice during the summer! The need for such a rush is understandable: tiny birds, even those that winter in harsh taiga forests, often die, and it is necessary to urgently and quickly restore their numbers.
Having lost parental care, the kinglets of the first brood initially stay together with their brothers and sisters, but in July they already gather in flocks and begin to wander through the coniferous forests. In September, young birds molt and acquire bright “crowns”.
INTERESTING FACTS
There is a well-known rule of ecology: in the north, the size of animals is usually larger than in the south. The fact is that heat is generated in a small volume and transferred through a relatively large surface. As size increases, the volume grows faster than the surface, so it is easier for large animals (and people, by the way, too) to stay warm than small ones. Can you imagine how difficult it is for a king to retain its heat, and how much you need to eat to do this? And the days in winter are short... By the way, in order not to lose precious warmth, kinglets often spend the night in a flock, huddled closely together.
LIFE IN NUMBERS
The testicles of the king are about 12 mm long and 10 mm wide. Moreover, the total weight of the clutch is about 120% of the female’s weight! It's very difficult to be small.
A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF
Class: birds.
Order: passerines.
Family: kinglets.
Genus: kings.
Species: yellow-headed wren.
Latin name: Regulus regulus.
Size: body length - 9-11 cm, wingspan - 15-17 cm.
Weight: 4-8 g.
Life expectancy of the yellow-headed kinglet: 2-3 years.
Birds belonging to the family kinglets- Regulidae, very small and mobile, weighing only 5-8 g. Apparently, they are close to the warblers, with which some taxonomists combine them into one family. This family, small in the number of species (5-6), including 3 genera, is distributed in Eurasia, North Africa and North America. There are 3 species of two genera living in the CIS.
Yellow-headed Kinglet (Regulus regulus) considered the smallest bird of our fauna, it is quite common in coniferous and mixed forests of Europe and Asia. This fluffy bird with a short tail has an olive-green upper body, whitish underparts, two light transverse stripes on the shoulders, and the top of the head with an orange or lemon-yellow cap bordered on the sides by wide black stripes.
Kinglets belong to the sedentary and nomadic birds of our forests. It’s amazing how such a small bird, weighing only 4-5 g, can withstand our frosts. There is another problem - the bird is an insectivore, collecting small arthropods from coniferous branches - spiders, caterpillars, eggs, larvae and pupae of other insects. And after all, she has enough wintering invertebrates until spring...
Kinglets nest high on spruce trees, making a spherical nest with a wide upper entrance. The clutches are large - up to 8-10 reddish eggs with brown spots. During the nesting period, the kinglets stay in pairs, not letting other brothers get close, but in other seasons they gather in friendly flocks, sometimes joining with flocks of tits. Their song is quiet and ringing - “tsi-fly-hin, tsi-fli-hin”, but everyone is more familiar with the call heard at any time of the year, and especially during periods of migration - the thin and gentle “tsi-tsi-tsi”. Kings are kept by true fanciers, as they are among the most delicate and demanding. It is especially difficult to accustom a king to homemade surrogate food. At first, it is better to keep them in low, small cages; then they will easily find a wide feeder, into which you should place as many different foods as possible, including live insects. Sedated kinglets are trusting of humans and take soft food and mealworms well. Outside the nesting period, they can be kept in a flock, but in the spring they should definitely be seated in pairs or alone, since they become aggressive and attack individuals of the same sex.
Another species of this genus is not so widespread, but its color is brighter. This red-headed wren (Regulus igiiicapillus), included in the Red Book of Russia due to its rarity and limited range. It lives in coniferous and mixed forests of the Caucasus, Crimea, Western and Central Europe, Asia Minor and north-west Africa. It differs from the yellow-headed kinglet by a white “eyebrow”, gray cheeks and a black transverse stripe on the forehead. Otherwise, these species are very similar to each other.
Painted titmouse (Leptopoecile sophiae) sometimes referred by some taxonomists to the family of tits, and by others to the thymelia. This is one of the smallest representatives of the fauna of the CIS. It lives in the mountains of the Tien Shan, Dzhungar Alatau and other mountain systems of Central and Central Asia. This bird deserves full protection.
The color of the bird fully corresponds to its name; it is indeed painted with a unique range of colors - blue, indigo, violet and reddish. All this, along with fluffy plumage and a long tail, attracts attention to her. The song of the painted titmouse consists of quiet muttering, whispering and creaking sounds.
These unusually delicate and fragile creatures can only live with very experienced bird lovers. Very rarely, the painted titmouse is found in collections of songbirds among Moscow fanciers. I know of a case where it was kept by R.L. Boehme.
Vladimir Ostapenko. "Birds in your home." Moscow, "Ariadia", 1996
The yellow-headed wren is a bird known for its singing. Her voice is rightfully considered one of the best in the animal kingdom. But, despite its great popularity, many facts from the life of this bird were hidden from the eyes of ornithologists for a long time. However, the advent of modern equipment helped solve this problem.
So, what do we know about this bird: where does it live and what does it eat? What enemies does she have? And why do people love her?
Kinglet - songbird
Probably everyone who has been to a pine forest has heard about the wren bird. After all, the Russian forest is often associated with her chirping. It's funny, but for a long time people could not understand who was making these beautiful sounds. And the reason for this is the small size of the bird, which made it difficult to notice among the treetops.
As for today, now everyone recognizes her. But even so, not many people know that there are about 7 species of these feathered creatures in the world. The most common population is the yellow-headed kinglet. But let's talk about everything in order.
Wren bird: description
Kinglets belong to the passerine order. At the same time, they have been allocated a whole family, which is called “royal”. All birds of this family are tiny, which is why they are also called European hummingbirds. Thus, the body length of adult individuals rarely exceeds 7-10 cm, and their weight ranges from 5-7 grams.
Almost all kinglets have light gray plumage. At the same time, the wings and back are painted in green tones, which vary from light green to olive shades. The bird's belly is much lighter than the rest of its body. However, the main feature is the crest on the head, which resembles a crown. It is this that is the calling card of the kinglet, and its color varies depending on the type of bird.
Habitat
The wren bird does not tolerate cold well, so it lives only in relatively warm parts of the planet. In particular, it can be found in Europe, Southern Siberia, Western China, North America, as well as in some regions of the Himalayas.
At the same time, the wren prefers to settle in coniferous or mixed forests. It should also be noted that these birds are very friendly. They always unite in flocks consisting of several birds and rarely leave each other.
Bird everyday life
Let's start with the fact that this is a very active bird. The wren can spend the whole day on the move, exploring the area or playing with its neighbors. And since such friendships are rare in the bird kingdom, they are very curious to scientists.
And yet, the wren spends most of the day searching for food. Despite its miniature size, it needs huge amounts of protein. So, throughout the day, the wren eats from 4 to 6 grams of food, which is comparable to its own weight. It should also be remembered that this species of birds does not know how to crush its food with its beak, which is why they have to hunt only small prey.
As for the diet, the wren bird eats exclusively insects. Only with the arrival of winter does it switch to spruce seeds, because there is simply no other food during this period.
Life cycle
Alas, the wren bird is not a long-liver. On average, it lives from 3.5 to 4 years, although most birds do not live up to this period. The reason for this is that they do not tolerate cold well, and many individuals die in winter from severe frosts.
And yet the kinglet population does not suffer much from this fact. Indeed, despite their low vitality, they multiply very quickly. So, after the first year of life, the female is ready to start a new family.
Mating games begin with the first warmth. Thanks to this, in early May, the kinglets are already building nests for themselves. At the same time, all the work on building the house falls on the female, and the males only protect their spouse. The nest itself has a spherical shape, which protects the chicks from possible aggression from other birds.
On average, one female produces from 5 to 9 eggs. After two weeks of incubation, the chicks hatch from them. At the same time, the male constantly takes care of both the female and his children. As for the chicks, after 18-20 days they can safely leave the nest.
Man and songbird
Kinglets quickly get used to changes in the environment, and therefore react calmly to the presence of people. Recently, they are increasingly beginning to settle near noisy cities. True, they have not yet decided to replace the forest with city parks.
Therefore, you can enjoy the singing of the kings only when you get out into the forest. But perhaps this is for the best, because this is where the whole charm of wild nature lies.
