Wallcreeper

Identification

The wallcreeper is a 15.5–17-centimetre (6.1–6.7 in) long bird, with a mass of 17–19 grams (0.60–0.67 oz). Its plumage is primarily blue-grey, with darker flight and tail feathers. Its most striking plumage feature, though, are its extraordinary crimson wings. Largely hidden when the wings are folded, this bright colouring covers most of the covert feathers, and the basal half of the primaries and secondaries. The subspecies T. m. nepalensis is slightly darker than the nominate race.<p>Though largely silent, both male and female wallcreepers sing, the females generally only while defending feeding territories in the winter. The song is a high-pitched, drawn-out whistle, with notes that alternately rise and fall. During the breeding season, the male sings while perched or climbing.

Taxonomy

There is some disagreement among ornithologists as to where the wallcreeper belongs in the taxonomic order. Initially, Linnaeus placed it in the family Certhiidae, along with the treecreepers. The wallcreeper is placed in a monotypic family Tichodromadidae by, amongst others, Clements 2007, while other authorities such as Dickinson 2003 put it in the monotypic Tichodromadinae, a subfamily of the nuthatch family Sittidae. In either case, it is very closely related to the nuthatches. A 2016 phylogenetic study of members in the superfamily Certhioidea suggests it is a sister of the Sittidae. At least one other species of wallcreeper is known from the fossil record, Tichodroma capeki (Late Miocene of Polgardi, Hungary).<p>The genus name Tichodroma comes from the Ancient Greek teikhos "wall", and dromos "runner". The specific muraria is Medieval Latin for "of walls", from Latin murus, "wall". Alternatively, the wallcreeper is named the red-winged wall creeper.<p>Two subspecies are recognized:

Scientific name

Tichodroma muraria

Authority

(Linnaeus, 1766)

Order

Passeriformes

Family

Tichodromidae

Genus

Tichodroma

Range and habitat

A bird of the high mountains, the wallcreeper breeds at elevations ranging between 1,000 and 3,000 metres (3,300 and 9,800 ft). It is largely resident across its range, but moves to lower elevations in winter, when it is found on buildings and in quarries. In France it regularly and repeatedly winters on cathedrals and viaducts in Brittany and Normandy. Birds have wintered as far afield as England and the Netherlands, where one spent two consecutive winters between 1989 and 1991 at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. The species is resident across much of the Himalayas, ranging across India, Nepal, Bhutan and parts of Tibet and also as a winter visitor in Bangladesh.

Migration

Complete migrants

Behavior

Migration pattern: Complete migrants.

Conservation

Population trend: stable.

Population trend

stable