THRUSHES. BLUEBIRDS 



mountain bird in the summer, leaving the 

 valleys in May to nest well up in the timbered 

 slopes of the Coast and Cascade Mountains. 

 Its song is a clear, vibrant whistle given in a 

 minor key and in a descending scale. It has 

 a melancholy strain about it that is hard to 

 describe. As the song floats down from the 

 top of a giant fir in the mountains it has all 

 of the w^ildness and sweetness of the song of 

 the hermit thrush. 



_ r. Russet -backed thrush, Hylocichla vs- 



^^ tulaia usiulata, 7.25 



Distribution: Pacific Coast region from 

 Alaska south to Lower California. Migrating 

 in winter south through Mexico and Central 

 America to northern South America. Abun- 

 dant summer resident on the Pacific Coast 

 from sea level to high mountains. Two 

 closely allied species are; willow thrush of 

 British Columbia, Alberta and Manitoba 

 south to Central Oregon, Utah and Iowa; and 

 the olive-backed thrush, found in North and 

 South America and on the Pacific Coast from 

 Alaska south to eastern Oregon. 



Tlie thrushes live in the deep w^oods where 



the ground is carpeted w^ith moss and ferns. 



The dozen or more species that live in the 



west are alike in their fondness for thickets 



9 



