This is birdnode.

Only a few songbirds anywhere in the world are as small as bush tits.

Weighing in at 5.3 grams, that's about the weight of four paper clips.

They're smaller than many hummingbirds.

Take a close look at a bush tit and you'll marvel at how tiny it is.

But bush tits take full advantage of their diminutive size,

while larger insect eaters forage on the upper surfaces of leaves and twigs.

Bush tits hang beneath them, that gives them exclusive access to all the tiny insects and spiders,

protected from the rain and hiding out of sight of other birds.

Watch a foraging flock of bush tits and you'll have to smile.

A shrub or small tree may be full of little brown, long-tailed birds hanging upside down like Christmas tree ornaments.

After they finish nesting, bush tits go about in flocks of 30 or more.

One bird after another flies from bush to bush like a troop passing in review.

Their quiet calling helps them keep track of one another.

Where they live in suburbia, a flock of 30 bush tits can do a great job of ridding a garden of harmful aphids and scale insects.

Good things do come in small packages.

For bird note, I'm Mary McCann.