GRAY-CHEEKED THRUSH 193 



5.60 percent; no honey bees were found. Caterpillars were third in 

 importance, 8.81 percent. Grasshoppers were not a favorite food, 

 amounting only to 1.72 percent. Other insects, including the 

 remains of a seventeen-year locust in one stomach, amounted to 2.89 

 percent, spiders 5.77 percent, and a few other animals, such as craw- 

 fishes, sowbugs, and angleworms, to 0.41 percent. 



Among the vegetable food, a few seeds of blackberries or rasp- 

 berries were found, but they may have come from wild plants and 

 amounted to only 0.15 percent. "Wild fruits of 18 different species 

 (23.98 percent) make up nearly one-fourth of the whole food." The 

 only fruits found in more than two stomachs were: Wild black cherries 

 in 5, wild grapes in 5, flowering dogwood in 5, and elderberries in 3 

 stomachs. 



Francis Zirrer, of Hay ward, Wis., sends me the following note: "In 

 spring this bird, and many others, subsist largely on larvae of various 

 Diptera, inhabiting the rich woodland soil in such masses, that from 

 the bottom of a small puddle of snow water a few yards square a good 

 handful might be obtained, drowned and dead. During the fall 

 migration the bird feeds often on the hairy caterpillars (Arctiidae) 

 which at that time crawl everywhere. However, it does take con- 

 siderable time and much pounding before the caterpillar is disposed 

 of. But most of the fall feeding is done on the berries of Aralia 

 racemosa. As shy as this thrush usually is, it will come directly under 

 the windows of a lonely woodland cabin, if the plant grows there and 

 the fruit is plentiful, which is usually the case, as this plant with its 

 later period of blooming does not, as a rule, suffer from late frosts. 

 This is the best opportunity for the dweller to watch this and the next 

 thrush at the closest possible range through the window pane, often 

 only 2 or 3 feet away. And, since the ripening of these berries on the 

 truly enormous clusters proceeds slowly and over a period of several 

 weeks, the birds will stay as long as there are any berries left, unless 

 the weather turns exceptionally cold and nasty." 



Behavior. — Like other thrushes of this group, the gray-cheeked is 

 extremely shy, both on migrations and on its breeding grounds. We 

 may hear it singing on the top of some bush or small tree, but, as 

 we approach, it dashes down into the underbrush and disappears. 

 It is even more shy than the oliveback. It is most often seen on the 

 ground during migrations, hopping about in a characteristic thrush- 

 like attitude, erect on its long legs and searching for food, most of 

 which is found on the ground among the fallen leaves. It is seldom 

 seen in the high treetops, as the oliveback so often is. 



Wendell Taber writes to me that on May 17, 1942, in a cemetery 

 at Nahant, Mass., "one of these birds seemed to have a definite 

 preference for the top of a wooden fence. Although a number of us 



