430 BULLETIN 20 3, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Dr. Coues (1888) describes a well-populated locality near Wash- 

 ington, D, C, as follows : "The locality is along the Potomac River, 

 on the Virginia side, about seven miles from the city, among some 

 small hills from which all the large trees have been cut away, and 

 which are now grown up to a thick scrub of hickory, dogwood, and 

 laurel {Kalmia latifolia)^ with here and there a few young pines 

 and cedars. Here we found breeding within a small area an astonish- 

 ing number of the birds, perhaps more than fifty pairs." 



On the pine barrens of Cape Cod, Mass., where the prevailing trees 

 are pitch pines {Pinus rigida), more or less widely scattered, the 

 prairie warbler finds a congenial summer home in the undergrowth 

 of scrub oaks. Similar haunts are frequented on the pine barrens 

 of New Jersey and farther west and south, where tlie shortleaf pine 

 {Pinus echinata) is the characteristic tree. In such places the pine 

 warblers live mainly in the pines and the prairie warblers in the under- 

 brush, both birds being usually found wherever such conditions pre- 

 vail, each in its own sphere. 



S'pring. — Dr. Chapman (1907) writes of the spring migration: 

 "From its winter home in the West Indies and Florida, the Prairie 

 Warbler begins to move northward early in March, though the full 

 tide of migration does not start until the last of the month. 



"The latest records of striking the southern lighthouses are in the 

 first half of May and the earliest spring date is March 7. Thus the 

 period of spring migration in the southern United States extends 

 through more than nine weeks." 



Territory. — We have sometimes found as many as a dozen pairs of 

 prairie warblers nesting within a limited area, but we have never 

 seen any such concentration as that mentioned by Coues. Forbush 

 (1929), however, says: "Although it breeds occasionally in colonies, 

 the nests are widely scattered, and each male seems to patrol a cer- 

 tain small territory to which he lays claim, and where he is always 

 ready to give battle to any rival who encroaches on his section ; but if 

 danger in the shape of some enemy threatens the family of any one of 

 them, the entire colony soon joins in protesting the invasion or 

 threatening the invader." 



Nesting. — In our egg-collecting days of long ago, we used to find 

 plenty of nests of the chestnut-sided warbler in the fringe of low 

 hazel bushes that lined the old country roads in Rehoboth, Mass. 

 What few nests of the prairie warblers we found were in the more 

 extensive sprout lands or on the brushy hillsides, well back from 

 the roads. But in 1944 we were surprised to find that the prairie 

 warblers had almost entirely replaced the chestnut-sided and were 

 nesting in the hazel thickets along the road sides. The nests were 

 artfully concealed in the densest parts of the foliage, about 2 or 3 



