144 BULLETIN 203, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



allowed his freedom, he would hop upon us, fly from one to another, and dart 

 oft' over the side of the boat as if taking his departure ; when lo ! back he would 

 come with a fly or moth he had seen over the water and had captured. Several 

 flies were caught in this way. He searched over the whole boat and into the 

 hold for insects. Often he would fly to one or the other of us, as we were lying 

 on the deck, and into our hands and faces, with the utmost familiarity. He 

 received our undivided attention, but could have been no happier than we. 

 Upon reaching shore, amid the confusion of landing we lost sight forever of 

 our pretty friend." 



Voice. — The parula warbler has a simple, but to my ears a very 

 distinctive, song. In 1900 I recorded the song in my notes as ^^pree-e- 

 e-e-e-e-e, yip, a somewhat prolonged trill like a pine warbler's, but 

 fainter and more insect-like, ending abruptly in the short yip with a 

 decided emphasis." I have always been able to recognize it by the 

 explosive ending, which I never heard from any other wood warbler. 



Gerald Thayer wrote to Dr. Chapman (1907) as follows: 



The Parula is weak-voiced, and its call notes, as far as I know, are slight and 

 barely peculiar ; but it has at least three main songs, with great range of 

 variations. 



All may be recognized, or at least distinguished from the weak songs of 

 the Dendroicae, like the Blackburnian and Bay-breast, by their beady, buzzy 

 tones. In phrasing, in everything but tone-quality, certain variations of the 

 Parula's and of the Blackburnian's songs very nearly meet and overlap; but 

 the tell-tale tones remain unchanged, — wheezy and beady in the one, smooth as 

 glass in the other. Commonest of the Northern Parula's three main songs is prob- 

 ably the short, unbroken buzz, uttered on an evenly-ascending scale, and ending 

 abruptly, with a slight accentuation of the final note. Nest is that which 

 begins with several notes of the same beady character, but clearly separated, 

 and finishes, likewise on an ascending scale, with a brief congested buzz. The 

 third main song is based on an inversion of the second — a buzz followed by a 

 few separate drawled notes, high-pitched like the buzz-ending of the two other 

 songs. All these vary and intervary perplexingly. 



Aretas A. Saunders contributes the following notes on the song 

 of this warbler : "The parula warbler has two distinct types of song. 

 One is a simple buzzy trill rising in pitch, and frequently terminated 

 by a short, sharp note of lower pitch. Of 12 records of this song, 

 7 have the terminal note and 5 do not. The other form has the same 

 buzz-like quality, but begins with three or four short notes on the 

 same pitch, followed by a longer, higher note that is frequently, but 

 not always, slurred upward. Both songs are similar in length and 

 in pitch intervals. They vary from li^ to 1% seconds in length. The 

 rise in pitch varies from one to four and a half tones, and averages 

 about two tones. The actual pitch is exceedingly variable in individ- 

 uals and varies from A'" to D''"'. Songs vary considerably in 

 loudness, many of them becoming suddenly louder toward the end. 



"The species sings throughout migration, and on the breeding 

 grounds till late July. At that season I have seen males still smging 

 while feeding young just out of the nest." 



