The ‘brown-capped’ chickadee 

Sweet, social, curious, tame, bold and acrobatic are some of the many attributes that describe chickadees.

By Joan Collins

North America has seven chickadee species. In the Adirondacks, we are fortunate to have two of them, the abundant black-capped chickadee and the uncommon, sought-after boreal chickadee.

Boreal chickadee is a small songbird (10 g) with a brown cap and back, and bright cinnamon flanks. Similar to a black-capped chickadee, it possesses a black throat. Its plumage is fresh and crisp looking in the winter, but worn out in summer gaining it the nickname “dirty bird” during the breeding season!

Its range includes the northern coniferous forests from Alaska across Canada to Newfoundland including some of the northernmost United States. The Adirondack region represents the southernmost edge of its range, and home to the only disjunct population of boreal chickadees.

Boreal chickadee is a permanent resident of boreal habitat. It can be found in young and mature spruce and balsam fir forests, at high and low elevation, often near water. In winter, occasional movements south of their range can occur, likely due to food shortages, but within coniferous woods.

Omnivorous and opportunistic, their diet consists of insects and their eggs, larvae and pupae; spiders; some fruit; and seeds of conifers and birches. They also feed on carcasses and occasionally visit feeding stations for suet (from a butcher) and peanut butter.

Similar to many other year-round resident birds in cold climates, boreal chickadees cache food. Food items are secured by the bird’s saliva and web material from spiders, cocoons, or seed down.

Acrobatic, they frequently hang upside down as they forage. Food items are often held under foot as they eat.

Boreal chickadee vocalizations have a nasal, buzzy quality, like a “black-capped chickadee with a cold.” They have gargled trills considered to be their song. The nasal sounding tschick-a-dee-dee call is commonly heard, along with other call notes, including a very high-pitched single note I’ve only heard at nest sites.

In the lower elevations, boreal chickadees are often in mixed flocks that include black-capped chickadees, red-breasted nuthatches, brown creepers and golden-crowned kinglets.

If you enter their mossy boreal realm, these curious birds are likely to come check you out!

Cavity nesters, they utilize natural cavities or excavate holes in trees