- Regulus ignicapilla
Identification
Firecrest Regulus ignicapilla RANGE Patchy and discontinuous range in Europe breeding from Brittany, east across Europe, including Denmark, to about 300E in Russia. In the south breeds in the northern half of Iberia and extreme south of Spain, central and southern France, Italy and parts of the Balkans and Greece. Also breeds on Madeira, Mallorca, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily and Crete, in North-West Africa and parts of northern Turkey and the Caucasus. Very small numbers breed in Britain, mainly in southern England and the New Forest in particular.
Northern and eastern populations are migratory wintering in western Europe and around the Mediterranean, birds from remainder of range are largely resident. Recorded as a vagrant in Finland.
HABITAT Breeds in deciduous, mixed and coniferous forest, also evergreen oak and tree-heath around the Mediterranean.
SUBSPECIES Nominate race occurs over most of range, replaced by greyer-plumaged balearicus and in Mallorca and North Africa, madeirensis from Madeira is longer-billed with duller crown stripe and shorter supercilium
