Meet Marin's small birds
A few months ago, I wrote a column about the largest birds in our area. It's easy for everyday people to think of birds in everyday terms, dismissing sparrows and blackbirds as insubstantial and insignificant creatures while forgetting that we live among swans and eagles with wingspans over 7 feet. Size can grab our attention. But I find that an inverse phenomenon also occurs: We can also be drawn to smallness. We're used to noticing these smaller-than-average creatures — like tiny dogs, cats and toddlers — and remarking on their benign littleness. Smallness contributes to their cuteness and our affection. So, if you want to foster increased warmth towards birds, consider this proposition: Which are our smallest birds?
These birds may elicit less awe. But they may provoke more “awww.”
Exhibit A: People love hummingbirds, and hummingbirds are tiny. Our abundant year-round species, the Anna's hummingbird, weighs in at .15 ounces, or about as much as a nickel. And that's hefty for a hummingbird! Our recently arrived migrant hummingbird, the petite and rusty-sided Allen's hummingbird, tips the scales at only
.11 ounces — more like a penny's weight of bird. The tininess of hummingbirds is amplified in our mind by the inherent tininess of some of their activities (They hover like bees! They derive sustenance from flower nectar!) and made more remarkable and endearing by contrast with some others (Anna's hummingbirds reach speeds of 60 miles per hour in their courtship dives! Allen's lookalike, the rufous hummingbird, migrates nearly 4,000 miles!).
Or consider another tiny backyard bird: bushtits. Bushtits are another nickel-weight bird, weighing about a fifth of an ounce and having the appearance of a lessthan-regulation size ping-pong ball of gray and fluffy texture. To give some context in comparing such tiny birds to birds