Kinglets | Regulidae

Very small, round-bodied birds with a short tail and a needle-fine bill, used to pick springtails, aphids and spider eggs from among needles and bark crevices, usually while hanging beneath a branch tip and sometimes hovering briefly at the foliage. The crown is the family's signature: a yellow to fiery red stripe bordered with black on both sides, raised in display and in threat, and the head pattern is what separates the species. The voice sits exceptionally high, around eight kilohertz, high enough that older observers no longer hear the family at all. The nest is a deep hanging cup of moss, lichen and spider silk slung beneath a conifer branch and lined with hundreds of feathers, holding eight to eleven eggs — a large clutch for so small a body. On winter nights the birds huddle together to save heat.