- Black Capped Chickadee
One of the most common and easily recognized permanent bird residents of North America is the Black Capped Chickadee.
Chickadees are found across Canada and into the northern United States, and is the official provincial bird of New Brunswick. In general they do not migrate, only relocating to a different area if the population becomes high.
Their habitat consists of any area that has trees and shrubs, from woodlands to residential neighbourhoods and parks, and sometimes even cattail marshes. They frequently nest in the rotted hollowed areas of alder or birch trees.
During the fall and winter months they usually flock and in the spring and summer split into monogamous breeding pairs. During the spring breeding period, the black-capped chickadees may be very inconspicuous.
The diet of the chickadee is primarily insects (especially caterpillars) in the summer months. Seeds and berries become more prevalent in the winter months, with black oil sunflower seeds from bird feeders a particular favourite. Food may be stored in various sites such as dead leaves, bark clusters of coniferous tree needles and knot holes. The memory of chickadees for the location and the type of food of the various food caches has been observed to be up to twenty-eight days.
Perhaps one of the most interesting facts of this bird is the ability to reduce their body temperature by up to 10-12 degrees celsius to conserve energy on cold winter nights, one of the few bird species known with this capability.
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