The Common Treecreeper is a small passerine bird. It is very similar to other treecreepers, and has a curved bill, patterned brown upperparts, whitish underparts, and long stiff tail feathers which help it creep up tree trunks. It can be most easily distinguished from the very similar Short-toed Treecreeper, which shares much of its European range, by its different song. The Common Treecreeper has nine or more subspecies which breed in different parts of its range in temperate Eurasia. This species is found in woodlands of all kinds, but where it overlaps with the Short-toed Treecreeper in western Europe it is more likely to be found in coniferous forests or at higher altitudes. It nests in tree crevices or behind bark flakes, and favours introduced Giant Redwoods as nest sites where they are available. The female typically lays five or six pink-speckled white eggs in the lined nest, but eggs and chicks are vulnerable to attack by woodpeckers and mammals, including squirrels. The Common Treecreeper is insectivorous and climbs up tree trunks like a mouse, to search for insects which it picks from crevices in the bark with its fine curved bill. It then flies to the base of another tree with a distinctive erratic flight. This bird is solitary in winter, but may form communal roosts in cold weather.

Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Treecreeper

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1462: Forces led by Vlad III Dracula of Wallachia attacked an Ottoman camp at night in an attempt to assassinate Mehmed II. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Night_Attack)

1775: American Revolutionary War: British forces took Bunker Hill outside of Boston. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bunker_Hill)

1789: French Revolution: The Third Estate of France declared itself the National Assembly. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Assembly_%28French_Revolution%29)

1953: The Group of Soviet Forces in Germany and the Volkspolizei violently suppressed an uprising in Berlin against the East German government. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uprising_of_1953_in_East_Germany)

1972: The Watergate scandal began after five men were arrested for breaking and entering the offices of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C.. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watergate_scandal)

1982: The body of Italian banker Roberto Calvi, known as "God's Banker" due to his close association with the Vatican, was found hanging from scaffolding beneath London's Blackfriars Bridge. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_Calvi)

_____________________ Wiktionary's Word of the day:

thrall: One who is enslaved. (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/thrall)

_____________________ Wikiquote of the day:

Our security strategies have not yet caught up with the risks we are facing. The globalization that has swept away the barriers to the movement of goods, ideas and people has also swept with it barriers that confined and localized security threats. -- Mohamed ElBaradei (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mohamed_ElBaradei)