138 BIRDS OF NEW ENGLAND AND EASTERN NEW YORK 



Fig. 29. Migrant Shrike 



win<T3 and tail black and white; under parts grayish-white. Im. 

 in summer. — Top of head and back brownish-gray; breast washed 

 with brownish; black lines hardly extending beyond the e^e, and 

 not meeting over the bill. 



Nest, in a thick bush or tree, often a hawthorn bush. EggSf 

 whitish, thickly marked with browm. 



The Migrant Shrike is a not uncommon summer resident 

 of the Lake Champlain Valley. It breeds rarely in the 



rest of northern Xew England, 

 and is a very rare migrant in 

 southern New England and 

 the Hudson Valley. Its habit 

 of perching on the tips of trees 

 or bushes, and its contrasting 

 colors, gray, black, and white, 

 make it easy to observe and 

 recognize. It feeds on grasshoppers, frogs, and mice, and, to 

 a certain extent, on small birds, and impales its prey on 

 thorns. Its song is described as Ioav and musical, and its 

 call-notes as harsh and unmusical. The ordinary shrike in 

 New England between October and April is the Northern 

 Shrike. The Migrant is over an inch smaller than its rela- 

 tive, and the black marks in front of the eyes meet across 

 the forehead. 



NoRTHEKx Shrike. Lanius horealis 



10.32 



Ad. — Upper parts ash-gray, becoming whitish on the forehead, 

 over the eye, and on the rump; a blackish stripe back of the eye, 

 extending to the base of the bill, but not over it; wings and tail 

 black and white; under parts grayish-white, crossed with dark 

 wavy lines which show only at close range. Im. — Upper parts 

 grayish-brown; wings and tail duller; under parts much more 

 distinctly covered with wavy lines of dark gray. 



The Northern Shrike is a winter visitant in New York 

 and New England ; rare in some years, not uncommon in 



