Troglodytes Troglodytes

...or Jenny Wren to give it its familiar name. To quote the indispensable Birds Britannica it is "one of the elite group of birds with a personalised nickname. None seems more deserving. Few animals, let alone birds, convey such a sense of indomitable spirit and vitality. The posture and jerky movements suggest constant alertness, the low buzzing flight has an almost insect-like intensity, while the bird's volcanic song generates an aura of energy out of all proprtion to its physical size. [...] [It] never sings except to say that it is the best of all possible worlds."