Measurements. Total length about 140 mm.; wing 74 to 79 mm.; tail about 42 mm.; tarsus about 18 mm.; culmen about 15 mm.
Distribution. The whole of the North-West Himalayas from the Baluchistan boundaries where well forested, Afghanistan, N. Kashmir to the hills next the plains as far as the pines continue and as far east as Garhwal.
Nidification. This Nuthatch breeds freely throughout its range. Rattray took many nests in the Murree Hills in June, and says that a favourite site is high up in a tall fir-tree that has been struck by lightning and cracked down the centre, a convenient place in this crack being selected for the nest. They lay from four to eight eggs, which are just like those of the various forms of Chestnut-bellied Nuthatches and measure on an average for 50 eggs about 18·2 × 13·7 mm. The nest is ditiicult to find, both from its position and the cautious habits of the birds.
Habits. This is a bird of high elevations, being found principally between 7,000 and 12,000 feet and, according to Rattray and others, seldom below 8,000 feet. Its range, however, seems to be decided by the forest growth and it will not frequently be found outside the regions of firs, pines and other coniferous trees. Stoliczka says that it feeds principally on the seeds of Pinus girardiana and that its voice is a loud, uniform, melancholy call, uttered while it is busily engaged in securing a pine-seed in the bark of a large tree. Whitehead likens its call to the French word "pain," and he and Davidson both say that the monotonous, wailing cry is to be heard in the forests all day long.
(118) Sitta formosa.
The Beautiful Nuthatch.
- Sitta formosa Blyth, J. A. S. B., xii, p. 938 (184.3) (Darjiling); Blanf. & Oates, i, p. 306.
Vernacular names. Dao-mojo-gadeba (Cachari); Tishe Kuyi gumbo (Lepcha).
Description. Upper plumage black, streaked with pale blue on the upper back and the sides of the neck and with brilliant cobalt-blue elsewhere; sides of the head and chin fulvous white, the feathers round the eye and over the ear-coverts blackish at their bases; lesser wing-coverts, primary-coverts, primaries and secondaries bright blue; edges of the median and greater coverts and of the inner secondaries white; remainder of wing blue; scapulars, louer back and rump verdigris-blue; central tail-feathers blue with black bases and black next the shafts; the next two pairs black edged with blue; the others black with progressively larger white tips, blue-edged on the exterior margins; lower plumage dull chestnut.
