LAND BIRDS. 675 



with canker-worms in Illinois, saj's: "Nearly half their food was canker- 

 worms, with al)Oiit 10 percent additional of other lepidoptera, 13 percent 

 was beetles and 10 percent bugs, the latter including a few chinch-bugs. 

 Two of the birds had eaten Psenocerus supernotatus, making 4 percent" 

 (Bull. No. 6, State Lab. Nat. Hist., pp. 8-9). 



The song is a delightful little warble given with great rapidity and some- 

 times continued much longer than at others. Usually it is repeated twenty 

 or thirty times with only a few seconds intermission, and during the nesting 

 season the bird sings from morning till night with the utmost energy, 

 apparently fairly bubbling over with exuberance of joy. Bicknell says: 

 "From its arrival late in April until after midsummer the full song is 

 heard, and though sometimes ending in July is often continued through 

 the first week of August. August 15 is my latest date for the song. * * * 

 With the change of the song (usually in July) a change of habits begins 

 and likewise gradually progresses. The birds forsake the vicinity of 

 dwellings and their accessory buildings. To the la}^ observer they have 

 disappeared, but the experienced eye will detect them inhabiting the 

 rocks and shrubber}^ of wild and unfrequented localities often remote 

 from human habitation. In such places the autumn song is to be heard, 

 though to one familiar only with the characteristic song of the earlier 

 season its authorship would hardly be suspected. It has none of the 

 spontaneity and vigor of the spring song, but is a low rambling warble" 

 (Auk, I, 1884, 137-138). 



TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 



Adult: Olive-brown above, sometimes more rusty, sometimes more grayish, always 

 more reddish on rump and upper tail-coverts; the wings and tail always distinctly barred 

 with brown and black, and the same pattern often shomng more or less distinctly on 

 head and back; below grayish or brownish-white, lighter on throat and belly, darkest 

 on breast and flanks; under tail-coverts brown, heavily barred with dusky. Sexes aUke; 

 seasonal changes slight. 



Length 4.25 to 5.25 inches; wing 1.90 to 2.15; tail 1.70 to 2.10. 



306. Winter Wren. Nannus hiemalis hiemalis (Vieill). (722) 



Synonyms: Wood Wren, Mouse Wren, Spruce Wren, Short-tailed Wren.^ — Troglodytes 

 hiemalis, Vieill., 1819, A. O. U. Check-list, 1886, and others. — Anorthura hyemahs, Coues 

 and Prentiss, 1861. — Anorthura troglodytes hyemalis, Coues, 1872. — Olbiorchilus hiemalis 

 hiemalis, Oberh., 1902. 



Similar in a general way to the House Wren, but with the tail much 

 shorter in proportion and the feet decidedly larger. The upper parts, 

 wings and tail are brown or rufous like those of the House Wren, Init the 

 under parts are much darker than in that species, being brownish-white 

 or light brown from the chin to the middle of the breast, back of which 

 the color deepens and the whole of the breast, belly and sides are barred 

 with black. 



Distribution. — Eastern North America, breeding from the northern 

 parts of the United States northward, and in the Alleghanies south to 

 North Carolina, wintering fi'om about its southern breeding limit southward. 



This tiny wren is a summer resident of by far the larger pait of the 

 state, but its habits are such that it is commonly overlooked in the summer 

 and thus in the southern half of the state is known mainly as a spring 

 and fall migrant. Possibly a few winter in the southern part of the Lower 

 Peninsula, but we have been unable to find an actual record. It reappears 



