WHITE-THROATED SPARROW 1373 



batched on either June 7 or June 8 in both years. Ten of these 22 

 nests were lost through predation, but fledged young left the remaining 

 12 nests between June 15 and June 20. 



Although white-throats commonly renest after the loss of the first 

 nest, they rarely rear more than one brood per season. Observations 

 on some 50 pairs showed at least 16 that lost their first brood renested, 

 and one pair renested after two failures. Yet some evidence suggests 

 that occasionally white-throats do attempt a second brood. Lainevool 

 (held notes) saw a color-banded female carrying nesting material after 

 the first brood had been out of the nest about 10 days, but the second 

 nest was never located. During this interval, the first brood remained 

 with the male. L. de K. Lawrence (in litt.) reports a known second 

 brood at Rutherglen, Ontario. 



Plumages and molts. — Jonathan Dwight, Jr., (1900) calls the natal 

 down "pale clove-brown" and describes the ju venal plumage as 

 "Above, chestnut-brown, darkest on the head, streaked with dull 

 black, median line and superciliary line olive gray buff tinged, the 

 feathers of the back edged with buff. Wings and tail deep olive 

 brown, the coverts and tertiaries chestnut edged and buff tipped, the 

 secondaries and rec trices edged with paler brown, the primaries with 

 brownish white; edge of wing white. Below, dull white, washed 

 with buff on throat and sides and thickly streaked with clove brown, 

 the whiter chin merely flecked, the abdomen and crissum unmarked. 

 Bill slaty brown, feet pinkish buff, both darker when older." 



The first winter plumage is acquired by a partial postjuvenal molt. 

 In Algonquin Park in 1959, this molt started on some individuals 

 during the last week of July, and most birds were in molt between 

 August 15 and August 20. By the end of this month, most of the 

 young birds were indistinguishable from adults. According to 

 Dwight, and from our observations on banded birds in Algonquin 

 Park, the body feathers and wing coverts are replaced, but not the 

 wing and tail feathers. 



In the first winter plumage the arrangement of black and brown 

 on the lateral crown areas changes to black anteriorly grading into a 

 mixture of brown and black toward the neck. The median crown 

 stripe may remain the same olive gray as in the juvenal plumage, but 

 usually it becomes lighter tan. A small percentage of young birds 

 in winter plumage have the median crown stripe white (11 of 209 

 museum specimens examined). The superciliary line is yellow r in 

 front of the eye and light tan behind. Pale yellow appears on the 

 edge of the wing. The throat patch is white or dull white edged with 

 black, and within the patch two black malar lines extend posteriorly 

 from the lower edge of each side of the lower mandible. Dwight 

 describes the lower throat and breast as "ashy gray obscurely ver- 



