Red-headed Tit

The red-headed tit, or red-headed bushtit, is the Himalayan form (iredalei) of the black-throated bushtit. It has a rufous crown, a black throat patch below a white chin, a small whitish eyebrow, cool grey upperparts and whitish underparts with rufous-tinged flanks, with a pale yellow iris. The sexes look alike and young birds have paler caps. The bushtit group may be a species swarm that needs further study (BirdForum).

It lives mainly in broadleaved and mixed forest, especially oak, up to about 2,700m, and is mostly resident, foraging in flocks of up to 40 birds and often joining mixed-species flocks. In the Himalaya it breeds from March to May, building an oval ball of lichen and moss bound with spider silk and laying three to six white or pale pink eggs. A museum specimen comes from Sheopur Ridge in the Nepal Valley (BirdForum; museum collection record).