Little Bunting

Little Bunting (Emberiza pusilla )

The Little Bunting (Emberiza pusilla ) is a species of bird in the bunting family ( Emberizidae ). The Little Bunting is like the Waldammer, the Yellow-breasted Bunting and Snow Bunting a bird of the northern regions, which breeds in the tundra.

Description

Outside the breeding season the Little Bunting is colored rather unimpressive. The main features in order to distinguish them from other species (such as the similar looking Waldammer or reed bunting ), their small size and their red-brown cheeks. In the mating season the colors occur in the male out clearly. Now vertex and cheeks are chestnut brown with strong black boundary.

The top is brown-black striped, the white underside is provided with fine black stripes. The female is much duller than the male. In flight, the bunting looks rather stocky.

With a length of 13.5 cm and a weight of 15 g, it is one of the smaller species of the family.

Habitat

The Little Bunting is a bird of passage. It breeds in the tundra of northern Asia and northeastern Europe, where it breeds mainly in northern Finland. But it has also been bred in northern Norway and Sweden. Preference is given to sites near water - often they are found in the willow bushes in river valleys and swamps. During the winter she spends in the subtropics of northern India, southern China and the northern parts of Southeast Asia. Occasionally, individual birds lost in Western Europe. In Germany they are mostly seen on Helgoland.

Singing and food

The Little Bunting feeds mainly on seeds, the young birds are often fed with insects.

The calls are short, such as " phuick " or " fags ". The song, a gesungendes with changing pitches " between between between zwiehdi - di", bunting -like and reminiscent of the the Goldammer and ortolan.

Brood

The nest is built on the ground or near the ground in the willow bushes or in small birch trees. To build used the bird stalks, moss and lichens; for padding the inside is lined with fine grass and hair. The eggs, 4-5 in number, are light gray to greenish and about 19 mm long. They are incubated for 11-12 days. Every year there is one, sometimes two broods.