Educate Yourself About the Juniper Titmouse and Other Titmouses
Juniper Titmouse
The Juniper Titmouse has a short, pointed crest, all gray, very drab, a little larger than the Oak Titmouse, faint, or no brown tinge on the wings, and a short broad tail. Its length is 5in (14cm) Its wingspan is 9 in (23cm) Its voice is a “thick-a-de-dee”, like that of the chickadees, the whistled song is a “weety weety” or “tee-wit tee-wit”. Their eggs are white, with 1 clutch consisting of 6-8 or (3-9) eggs. The female incubates for about 14-16 days, and the fledging time is around 16-21 days. Both male and female feed their young. Male and female look alike.
The Juniper Titmouse and the Oak Titmouse, (Baeolophus inornatus), look alike, and are very closely related to each other, but these two species where recently separated from the former Plain Titmouse. None of these birds are restricted to its namesake tree, because pine seeds and acorns is about 80% of their diet during the winter months.
The Titmouse is a very persistent bird, it will hold its favorite food (acorns and beechnuts), under its feet or lodge it in a crevice and peck for several minutes, until the shell cracks, and then feast on the juicy meat inside. They usually will feed with their mate, or alone, and will spend most of their time cracking open, fallen nuts on the ground.
When there are lots of acorns, and pine seeds available, they cache (save) them for later feedings. But when nuts and seeds are scares, these birds become more sociable, and will feed in small flocks with other kinds of birds, searching for insects in tree bark.
The Juniper Titmouse will use abandoned woodpecker cavities to nest in, and they will usually stay within the same six-acre (2.4 hectare) territory. Young titmice will only wander a few territories away after leaving the nest, and for that reason there is a good chance that the same titmouse’s, will visit your lovely bird feeding garden, over and over again.
They also like to feed on caterpillars, and will extract the pupae from developing moth cocoons. Wasps, ants, beetle and many other insects, as well as fruit from wild cherries, poison ivy, blueberries, sumac, elderberries, bayberries, and mulberries, are enjoyed by the Juniper Titmouse. When you put out bird feeders, they seem to prefer large, striped sunflower seeds to smaller ones, and they will readily eat seeds from your hand, or even between your teeth, if you so choose.
To describe the fearlessness of these birds behavior is that they will actually pluck hair from live squirrels, groundhogs, and opossums. They can even try to pull hair from your head, if you are sitting a little to close to their nesting site. The Tufted Titmouse will build their nest out of moss, fibrous bark, leaves, snakeskin, and as we mentioned, hair.
If you like to attract the Juniper Titmouse, the Oak Titmouse, the Tufted Titmouse (most common east of the Great Plains), and the Bridled Titmouse (most common in oak and juniper woods in the South-west mountains), to your lovely bird feeding garden, plant berry bushes, like blueberry, serviceberry, bayberry, brambles, and wild cherries. Fill your bird feeders with whole peanuts, sunflower seeds, and suet; also provide bluebird size bird houses. Go to our section on NEST BOXES AND SHELFS, to learn more about the subject.
