Tufted Titmouse

Baeolophus bicolor · Tits and Chickadees (Paridae)

1 — At your feeder tomorrow.

Status

Year-round resident, southern and central NH; still expanding northward

Length

5.5–6.3 in

Regions

Coast · Merrimack · Lakes · Conn. River

What you notice first

A loud, clear, whistled "peter-peter-peter" ringing out of bare March woods, louder than the bird's size suggests.

Voice

The ringing "peter-peter-peter," anywhere from three to eleven repeats; a scratchy, chickadee-like scold when agitated.

Where & when

Deciduous woods, leafy suburbs, feeders. Common south of the White Mountains, increasingly regular in the Lakes Region, still scarce and local up north. Year-round.

Another southerner on the move. Titmice were essentially absent from New Hampshire before the mid-1900s and are now a fixture at feeders across the southern half of the state, with the frontier somewhere around the Lakes Region and climbing.

Grey above, pale below, rusty flanks, a big dark eye in a plain face, and that pointed crest it raises and lowers with its mood. At the feeder it behaves like a chickadee with more attitude — grabs one seed, flies to a branch, holds it underfoot, and hammers.

Titmice pair for life and hold territory year-round, and young from one year sometimes stay to help raise the next brood. The winter flock at your feeder may be one extended family.