BLACK-CAPPED CHICKADEE 333 



about five o'clock, by which time the music always came to an end. So one day 

 I rose half an hour earlier than common on purpose to have a look at my little 

 matutinal serenader. My conjecture proved correct. There sat the tit, within 

 a few feet of his apple-branch door, throwing back his head in the tru'cst lyrical 

 fashion, and calling Hear, hear me, with only a breathing space between the 

 repetitions of the phrase. He was as plainly singing, and as completely absorbed 

 in his work, as any thrasher or hermit thrush could have been. Heretofore I bad 

 not realized that these whistled notes were so strictly a song, and as such set 

 apart from all the rest of the chickadee's repertory of sweet sounds ; and I was 

 delighted to find my tiny pet recognizing thus unmistakably the difference between 

 prose and poetry. 



Francis H. Allen tells me that he has several times heard a chickadee 

 similarly engaged, also early in the morning. 



Among the several notes that lend themselves to syllabification is the 

 well-known chicka, dee-dee. Aretas A. Saunders (MS.) says of it that 

 it "is more variable than many suppose. While it is most commonly one 

 chicka followed by three or four dees, it may vary from one to ten dees, 

 and there are sometimes two chickas. The chicka is, as a rule, two tones 

 higher than the dees, and the pitch is B on the chicka and G on the dees, 

 in the next to highest octave on the piano." 



Another pretty note may be written sizzle-ee, or, when it falls in 

 pitch at the end, sisde-oo. A single bird often gives this phrase over and 

 over, sometimes alternating the two forms, and two birds may make a 

 two-part song of them, singing back and forth. The prettiest note of all, 

 and the most delicate, is a prolonged jingling — as if tiny, silver sleigh- 

 bells were shaking. 



Field marks. — The chickadee is a round, fluffy little bird, boldly 

 marked v/ith splashes of gray, black, and white in contrast to the streaks, 

 lines, and pencilings characteristic of many of the smaller birds. The 

 white side of the head, separating the black areas above and below it, 

 shines out brightly and forms a good field mark even in the distance. 

 The short bill and the fur-coat appearance of the plumage distinguish 

 the chickadee from any of the warblers with their slender bills and sleek, 

 elegant stylishness. And the invisible eye, hidden in black feathers, sets 

 the chickadee apart from the kinglets, even when colors are obscured 

 by the dark shadows of evergreens. 



Enemies. — The smaller, fast-moving hawks often capture a chickadee, 

 but the little bird is so watchful for danger and so quick in its move- 

 ments that it sometimes escapes from an attack. Tertius van Dyke 

 (1913) reports a narrow escape of a chickadee (aided by him, to be 

 sure) from the strike of a sparrow hawk. 



The northern shrike, too, is the chickadee's enemy, but it is not always 

 successful. Some years ago I (Winsor M. Tyler, 1912) described a 

 case in which a chickadee out-maneuvered a shrike thus: 



