Accentors | Prunellidae

Heggenmussen | Acentores

Small, compact birds with a sparrow-like body and dull grey-brown, streaked plumage, but carrying a thin, straight, sharply pointed bill with which they take insects, spiders and springtails from leaf litter, moss and rock crevices; in winter they switch to fine seeds. They forage on foot, creeping and shuffling over the ground in short steps with a slightly hunched back, rarely far from cover, a nervous flick running through wing and tail every few seconds. The head pattern separates the species: a grey hood, a black-spotted throat, a broad pale supercilium. The mating system is the family's signature: many species live not in pairs but in groups of two or more males with one or more females sharing a single range, chasing one another continuously and displaying with one wing raised and quivering; the care of the young is then divided among several birds. The eggs are unmarked blue. One genus, confined to Eurasia and North Africa, centred on the mountains of Asia.