296 THE TAWNY CREEPER. 



PEOPLE are al\va3-s remonstrating with the bird-man fur the asser- 

 tion that birds are to be found everywhere if you but know them. Especi- 

 ally do they talk of the great silent forests on the western slopes of the 

 Cascade Mountains, wdiere they have traveled for forty miles at a stretch 

 withotit seeing or hearing a living thing. Well ; you cannot show me a 

 square mile of woodland in all that area where at least the following 

 species of birds may not be found : Western Winter Wren, Western Golden- 

 crowned Kinglet, W'estern Flycatcher, Varied Thrush and California 

 Creeper'' ; and these, except the Flycatcher, at any season of the year. 

 Silent birds they are for the most part, l)ut each gives vent to a character- 

 istic cry by which it may be known. 



The Creeper is, par excellence, the bird of the forest. To him alone 

 the very bigness of the trees is of the greatest service ; for his specialty 

 is Ijark, and the more bark there is the harder is this little atom to dis- 

 tinguish. Not only does he inhabit the deeper forests of the Cascade ranges 

 and foothills, but his domain stretches eastward across the northern tier 

 of ].)ine-clad counties, and he is common aniung the tamaracks on the banks 

 of the Pend d'Oreille. 



In June, in the Stehekin N'alley of Chelan Count}', we found these 

 Creepers leading about troops (if fully grown )-oung. A recently occu- 

 pied nest was disclosed to us by a few twigs sticking out from behind 

 a curled-up bark scale of a fire-killed tree, near the Cascade trail. The 

 twigs proved to be eighteen inches beli.>w the top of the nest proper, 

 which was thus about twelve feet from the ground. The intervening space 

 was filled in loosel}' with twigs, bark-strips, moss, cotton, and every other 

 sort of woodsy loot. The mass was topped by a crescent-shaped cushion 

 over an inch in thickness, deeply hollowed in the center, six inches from 

 horn to horn, and four and a half from bole to bark; and this cushion 

 was composed entirely of soft inner bark-strips and a \-egetable fiber re- 

 sembling flax in qualit^- — altogether a s])len(lid creation. 



No. 115. 

 TAWNY CREEPER. 



A. O. U. No. 726 c. Certhia familiaris occidentalis Ridgway. 

 Synonym. — C-\liforxi.\x CrHepKR (A. O. U.). 



Description. — "Similar to C. f. zelotes but browner and more suiTused with 

 bufTy above: wing markings more pronouncedly butT: underparts more buiTy" 



a. Shading into tlie following variety, C. f. occidentalis. upon the lower levels. 



