Ground Tit

Pseudopodoces humilis (Hume, 1871)

≈20 cmLength45 gWeight

This gray-brown bird is the size of Eurasian Tree Sparrow and hops along the ground like a little rubber ball.

Busiest months: July · Most records: China

Least Concern

How to identify

Field marks

Head same color as underparts, with darker crown and a pale nape patch
Bill strong, slightly decurved and black
Upperparts mostly a darker yellowish-brown
Underparts grayish yellow-brown, with a rufous-yellow tinge

Male, female and young

Sexes alike in appearance.

Voice

A plaintive “cheep-cheep-cheep-cheep” whistle, also a two-syllable, finch-like call.

Where and when it's recorded

Ground Tit has been recorded at 76 of the 8,171 birding hotspots we track, in 1 country or region.

Records by month Northern Hemisphere

Where it's recorded most

Rubber Mountain PassChina113 records
Xiaobeihu Freshwater MarshChina98 records
E'La Mountain PassChina52 records

More places

Temple of Princess WenchengChina44 records
Qinghai Lake – K11 hillChina42 records
Flower LakeChina32 records
HeimaheChina31 records
Gahai LakeChina30 records
GangshikaChina29 records
Baizha ForestChina29 records

Countries and regions with the most records

China

eBird records via GBIF up to 2024-12-31. A record means someone listed it; more records partly mean more birders, not more birds.

About

The ground tit, Tibetan ground tit, or Hume's ground tit (Pseudopodoces humilis) is a bird of the Tibetan plateau north of the Himalayas. The peculiar appearance confused ornithologists who in the past variously called it Hume's groundpecker, Hume's ground jay or Tibetan ground jay on the assumption it belonged to the family Corvidae that includes the crows and jays. Although morphologically confusing, the species has since been identified using molecular sequence comparisons as being a member of the tit family (Paridae), and is now treated as the only species in the genus Pseudopodoces.

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