The complete mitochondrial genome of the Sitta villosa (Passeriformes: Sittidae) from China.

We describe the whole mtDNA genome of the Chinese nuthatch Sitta villosa in Tianlong Mountain, Shanxi, China. It is actually a circular molecular of 16,816 bp in length and consists 13 protein-coding genes, 22 transfer-RNA genes, 2 ribosomal-RNA genes, and 1 control region (D-loop, 1,243 bp in length). The nucleotide composition is 30.3% A, 30.1% C, 14.5% G, 25.1% T. The phylogenetic analysis based on the maximum likelihood method revealed the relationship of S. villosa was close to the three reported species within the same genus Sitta, which are S. nagaensis, S. himalayensis and S. carolinensis.