The Chinese penduline tit (''Remiz consobrinus'') is a

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...

in the family Remizidae. The species was first described by

Robert Swinhoe Robert Swinhoe FRS (1 September 1836 – 28 October 1877) was an English diplomat and naturalist who worked as a Consul in Formosa. He catalogued many Southeast Asian birds, and several, such as Swinhoe's pheasant, are named after him. Bio ...

in 1870. It is found in

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu River, Y ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

, and

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. There are 10 species in the family Remizidae. They are similar to true tits, but make characteristic penduline nests. They inhabit open fields and wetlands. They have sharp bill tips and the sexes look alike.

Description

The birds are 11 cm in length. They are small, pale birds of reedbeds with a fine-pointed bill, often in flocks of 10 to 20. Male: Greyish crown and nape. Black mask from forehead edged white. Chestnut mantle, half-collar and wing-coverts contrast with dark wings and black tail in flight. Whitish underparts are marked with buff. Female: Mask brown. Upperparts browner lacking chestnut.

Habitat and behavior

The Chinese penduline tit is found in

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

, especially in reedbeds and marshes in

northern China Northern China () and Southern China () are two approximate regions within China. The exact boundary between these two regions is not precisely defined and only serve to depict where there appears to be regional differences between the climate ...

. It inhabits, in nesting and non-nesting, in areas of agricultural pastures, wetlands with marshes or brackish ponds. It is often in flocks of 10 to 20. It winters in the south of China. Voice: Very thin drawn out 'tseeoo', 'sseeoo'. The Chinese penduline tit is

insectivorous A robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivorous animal or plant that eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the human practice of eating insects. The first vertebrate insectivores were ...

. It feeds on

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs ...

larva A larva (; plural larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle. The ...

spider Spiders ( order Araneae) are air-breathing arthropods that have eight legs, chelicerae with fangs generally able to inject venom, and spinnerets that extrude silk. They are the largest order of arachnids and rank seventh in total species ...

caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder Sym ...

s and sometimes, especially in winter, on small

seed A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiospe ...

s. The bird is an acrobatic climber, it can remain suspended by one leg and take its food with the other.

Reproduction

The male chooses the tree which will carry the

nest A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of organic materia ...

from 3 to 15 m height. The nest of the Chinese penduline tit is a marvel of

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...

. It has the aspect of a pear-shaped purse. The nest is extended by a tubular appendix and offers a lateral entrance. The female, having arranged the interior of the nest, generally lays between 5 and 10

egg An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the a ...

s, which she incubates alone during 12 to 15 days. When the young have fledged, the nest is deformed and partly disintegrated. They return there to sleep during 15 to 20 days, then leave the place.

Conservation status

The population is increasing, it is considered by the

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

as "

least concern A least-concern species is a species that has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as evaluated as not being a focus of species conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wild. T ...

References

Chinese penduline tit The Chinese penduline tit (''Remiz consobrinus'') is a bird in the family Remizidae. The species was first described by Robert Swinhoe in 1870. It is found in China, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, and Russia. There are 10 species in the famil ...

Birds of China Birds of Manchuria

Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Remizidae-stub