Every time I think I’ve found where the bird cuteness meter peaks, I find another adorable birb that sends the meter even higher into the stratosphere.
I mean, my job is finding cute animals and sharing them with you, the reader, and you would think that I’d have seen everything by now, but NOPE.
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Thus, I present to you: the tomtit.
(Pause for giggles.)
These little guys are endemic to New Zealand and closely related to the black robin. In fact, it’s thought that the tomtit’s willingness to “foster” the eggs of black robins is what saved the latter species from extinction.
There are five distinct subspecies of tomtits found throughout the New Zealand islands.
While they all have the distinctive enlarged head, round body, and tiny beak, they differ in coloration.
The North Island species have black heads with bright white bellies, but the South Island ones have yellow bellies. Those on the Chatham Islands and Auckland Islands look similar to the South Island tomtits, but are larger.
The subspecies on Snares Island is entirely black.
Though I am partial to the yellow bellies, they are all freaking adorable.
I mean, it’s hard to argue with a tiny bird that is basically a round head with legs and wings.
Though they aren’t technically robins, they are part of the same family.
While tiny and cute, these guys are big eaters, living off caterpillars, spiders, moths, and weta — which are a kind of insect the size of rodents. Lest you forgot that this was New Zealand we were talking about.
That said, knowing these little cuties take down giant insects is pretty badass.
