The White-breasted Nuthatch walks headfirst down tree trunks and hangs upside-down to hunt insects, despite lacking the woodpecker's back toes. It smears beetle remains around its nest entrance to scare off predators, and joins mixed flocks with chickadees and titmice to watch for danger and find food.
What do you know about the White-breasted Nuthatch? The White-breasted Nuthatch forages strangely similar to woodpeckers despite not being a woodpecker. In fact, nuthatches are pretty distinctive because, unlike most birds, they can walk down trees headfirst and hang upside down very much like woodpeckers. However, unlike woodpeckers, they don't have 2 back toes, which makes this even more impressive when you think about it. They also use their powerful beaks to smash insects and push them, as well as seeds, into crevices and between the wrinkly bits of bark. The nuthatch's call is considered to be loud, frequent, and somewhat annoying. They're also fairly common throughout most of North America. Nuthatches eat a lot of insects and caterpillars, but they're also happy to visit bird feeders. Nuthatches live in nesting holes just like— that's right— woodpeckers. However, nuthatches will wipe the mortal remains of stinky beetles all around the entrance to their holes to ward off predators, and I've never seen a woodpecker do that. Male White-breasted Nuthatches are misogynists. They push their partners out of the way to get the food when foraging, which is just rude as hell. They're also pretty cowardly. They rely on flocks that not only contain their fellow nuthatches, but they basically follow flocks of titmice and chickadees, relying on those birds to watch out for predators and to find food sources for them. Huh. Typical.
