Wrentit

Overview

Wrentit: Small, noisy songbird with dark gray-brown upperparts, thick streaked, red-brown to buff-brown underparts. Bill is short and black. Tail is very long and dark. Eyes are creamy white, bill is short and gray. Legs and feet are gray. Northern birds have darker upperparts than southern birds.

Range and Habitat

Wrentit: Resident from the Columbia River on the northern border of Oregon southward along coastal chaparral into Baja California and into the Sierra Nevada foothills of California. Chaparral, shrubs, and brush are preferred habitats.

INTERESTING FACTS

It used to be considered the sole member of the family Chamaeidae, but genetic studies show that it is the only American representative of the large Old World family of babblers, Timaliidae.
Pairs mate for life, and may be together for more than 12 years. Both sexes incubate and sing to defend the territory.
The Wrentit was first described in 1845 by William Gambel, an American naturalist and collector.
Their vibrant song is likened to the sound of a "bouncing ball" and is easily heard and recognized. In fact, they are more often heard than seen.

The Wrentit has a large range reaching up to around 260,000 square kilometers. This bird can be found in its native habitats of Mexico and the United States where it is seen mostly in shrubland locations. The global population of this bird is estimated to be around 1.5 million individual birds. Currently, it is not believed that the population trends for this species will soon approach the minimum levels that could suggest a potential decline in population. Due to this, population trends for the Wrentit have a present evaluation level of Least Concern.