536 HISTORY OF THE 



Habitat. Eastern North America; north to Hudson's Bay, 

 Great Slave Lake, etc. ; west to the Great Plains; south in 

 winter through Mexico to Central America; West Indies. 

 Breeds from the Gulf coast northward. 



Sp. Char. Plumage black striped with white above; beneath, white with 

 black streaks; wing with two white bands, and two outer tail feathers with 

 white spot near end of inner web. Adult male: Throat thickly streaked with 

 black, the latter sometimes nearly uniform. Young male: Throat pure white, 

 without streaks; otherwise like adult. Adult female: Similar to young male, 

 but colors duller, the back less intense, aijd white of lower parts tinged with 

 brownish, especially along sides. Nestling: Similar to adult female, but colors 

 much duller and less sharply defined, the head stripes dull grayish instead of 

 black, and the white parts tinged with fulvous. {Ridgioay.) 



Iris black; bill black, with under, m some cases, pale blue; 

 legs and feet bluish black; claws pale yellow. 



These remarkable birds, with the habits largely of the Creep- 

 ers and build of the Warblers, inhabit alike the high and low 

 woodlands, and often frequent the orchards, but they are the 

 most abundant along the banks of streams, or in the near vicinity 

 of water, as insect life usually abounds in such places. They 

 are enabled, by reason of the elongation of their toes, especially 

 the hinder one, to creep (spiral-like) around, up and down the 

 bodies of trees and their branches, where they industriously 

 search in the cracks and natural interstices of the bark for the 

 eggs and larva that are so injurious to the trees. They are, 

 therefore, of great value in ridding the forests and orchards of 

 their deadly pests. 



They are not timid, but rather bold birds, that neither seek 

 nor shun the habitations of man. As they move about they 

 often utter a weak call note, "Tsip," and during the early 

 breeding season their song is almost incessantly heard; a feeble 

 and not very musical effort. The birds arrive from the south 

 mated, or at least I have always met with them in the early 

 spring in pairs. 



Their nests are usually placed in a depression in the ground, 

 at the roots of a tree, under the shelter of a log, bush or bunch 



