EASTERN ROBIN 39 



Winter. — Most of the robins pass southward in fall to spend the 

 winter in the milder climate of the Middle Atlantic and Gulf States, 

 but occasionally flocks of considerable size remain in the Northern 

 States and eastern Canada where they are exposed to very low 

 temperatures. They have been reported as present during the winter 

 in the Province of Quebec, Canada, by Napoleon A. Comeau (1891), 

 in southern Maine by Nathan Clifford Brown (1911), in the Upper 

 Mississippi Valley by Miss Althea R. Sherman (1912), and in Nova 

 Scotia by Harrison F. Lewis (1919). 



In the Southern States robins gather in almost incredible numbers. 

 Mrs. Lotta T. Melcher (MS.) writes to Mr. Bent of watching robins 

 flying to a winter roost in Florida. She estimated that no fewer 

 than 50,000 birds assembled to spend the night "in low evergreen 

 bushes, in a cypress swamp." She says: "I could think of nothing 

 but being out in a snowstorm whose giant flakes never came to the 

 ground." 



Lester W. Smith (MS.) also writes of the invasions of robins during 

 the winter. "When a cold snap descends into the Florida peninsula," 

 he says, "with real truck-killing effect, there may come an invasion 

 of robins. A multitude of robins appears suddenly on the lawns, and 

 particularly in and under the cabbage palmetto trees, for it is on the 

 abundant, wild-cherrylike fruit of this native palm that the robins 

 feed, regardless of the protestations of the resident mockingbirds. 

 When the robins arrive here in vast numbers, the cabbage palms of 

 the entire district are soon stripped of their fruit." 



Julian D. Corrington (1922), speaking of the bird in winter in 

 Mississippi, says: "The Robin here is by no means a bird of the 

 lawns and gardens as in the north in summer, but is as wild as the 

 wildest and frequents only remote districts for feeding and roosting." 



Otto Widmann (1895) gives this interesting account of a winter robin 

 roost in Missouri, a contrast to the summer roosts of the north: 



The lower parts of the marsh, with the exception of the slough itself, are over- 

 grown with reeds five feet high, bendiDg over in all directions. These reeds are 

 matted into a regular thicket which is not easily penetrated. In the fall the 

 reeds are dry and yellow, some cinnamon and even dark chestnut brown. 



It is in these reeds that the Robin finds a safe retreat for the night, sheltered 

 equally well from wind and cold, rain and snow, and comparatively safe from 

 prowling enemies. During the day nothing betrays the roost. Not a Robin is 

 seen in the neighborhood all forenoon and for several hours of the afternoon. 

 An hour or two before sunset a few may arrive and stay in the trees along King's 

 Lake, but nobody would suspect anything extraordinary until half an hour before 

 sunset when the great influx begins. 



The new arrivals no more fly to the trees but alight on the ground, some in the 

 wheat field, some in the meadows, some on the corn and hay stacks, but the 

 majority flies directly into the reeds, while the others 6hift from place to place 



