Tufted Titmouse

Look for

A soft gray-blue songbird with a pointed crest, black eye, rust flanks, and a big dark eye set in a blank pale face. Cousin of the chickadee but taller and more assertive. They look perpetually startled.

Size: ~6.5" — bigger than a chickadee, smaller than a sparrow.

Listen for

• Song: a loud whistled "peter-peter-peter-peter" — clear, ringing, repeated. The second most-recognizable whistle in Memphis backyards after the cardinal.
• Call: a buzzy, scolding "tsee-day-day-day" when a hawk appears.

Where in Memphis

Every mature-tree yard, every park, every wooded trail. They flock with Carolina Chickadees, Downy Woodpeckers, and nuthatches in winter "tits and pals" gangs that roam woodlots together.

Behavior

• Bold at feeders. They grab a sunflower seed, fly to a branch, and hammer it open with their feet.
• Food cachers like chickadees — stash seeds across their territory.
• Cavity nesters — use old woodpecker holes and nest boxes.
• Remarkable memories for cache locations.

Story

"Peter-bird" is the common Southern name. The whistle is so specific that naturalist John James Audubon wrote that he could identify the species "by a single syllable of its song."

Like chickadees, titmice grow their hippocampus seasonally to manage food caches. And like Blue Jays, their gray-blue color is structural, not pigment.

Fun facts

• They sometimes pull hair from live squirrels, dogs, and even sleeping humans to line their nests. Memphians find tufts of their own hair in bird boxes.
• Their genus Baeolophus means "small-crested" in Greek.
• Oldest known wild Tufted Titmouse: 13+ years.