Bridled Titmouse
(Baeolophus wollweberi)
eBird describes the Bridled Titmouse like this: Unique: crested head with striking black-and-white pattern unlike any other bird. Primarily a Mexican species, with limited range in the U.S. Found in dry woodlands, especially with mixed oaks and junipers. Feeds on insects and acorns. Small and active; often joins mixed-species flocks with warblers, vireos, and kinglets. Visits feeders.
All About Birds adds this descriptive information about the Bridled Titmouse: A small titmouse with a dashing swirl of black and white on its face, the Bridled Titmouse is a specialty of the middle-elevation forests of the southwestern U.S. and adjacent Mexico. Like other titmice species, Bridled Titmice are often at the center of foraging flocks that can include chickadees, kinglets, warblers, vireos, tanagers, and nuthatches. They forage nimbly, often in oak trees, sometimes hanging upside-down from the slenderest of branches. They even serve as sentinels for the group, alerting other species to danger with harsh calls.
I saw, and photographed, my first Bridled Titmouse on the morning of August 4, 2022 in the courtyard of Rancho Santa Cruz. Our small field trip group had spent the night there and were visited that morning by quite a few birds in the courtyard just outside of our rooms. I wasn’t able to get an open shot of the Bridled Titmouse, but the pictures I did get were sufficient for identification.
“Cool Facts” About The Bridled Titmouse From All About Birds:
- At Bridled Titmouse nests, there are often one or more extra individuals that help raise the young—the only North American member of their family where cooperative breeding is common.
- When French ornithologist Charles Lucien Bonaparte scientifically described the Bridled Titmouse, he gave it the name wollweberi after the collector of the specimen. However, no historian has been able to figure out who this “Wollweber” actually was.
- In Arizona, Bridled Titmice typically occur at higher elevations than Juniper Titmice but lower than Mexican Chickadees. Mexican Chickadees tend to forage more in pines than in the oaks that Bridled Titmice use. When Bridled and Juniper Titmice come together, Bridled uses denser oak vegetation, while Juniper forages in more open oak and juniper.
- The Bridled Titmouse looks a lot like the Crested Tit of Eurasia, but it is not particularly closely related genetically—it’s much more closely related to the other North American titmice.
- The oldest recorded Bridled Titmouse was at least 6 years, 7 months old when it was recaptured and released during banding operations in Arizona.