256 BULLETIN 196, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



leaden sky, their voices and shapes gradually diminishing as the vast- 

 ness of the murky sky enveloped them." 



The flock observed by Mr. Mason was not "surprisingly large," for 

 the birds are often seen in larger flocks, sometimes as many as a hun- 

 dred, though usually more or less scattered. Late in summer and 

 early in fall mixed flocks of old and young desert their breeding resorts 

 and wander about the open country and woodland, often associated 

 with similar flocks of roving robins, all of which are much wilder and 

 more restless than they are about our grounds in nesting time. Bagg 

 and Eliot (1937) state that, in the Connecticut Valley in Massachu- 

 setts, "in October, transient Bluebirds are abundant, and natives 

 come back as if to say good-bye to their homes, and sometimes carry 

 nesting-material into their boxes, in that Indian Summer of the pro- 

 creative instinct that many birds evince on warm October days." 



Referring to the Buckeye Lake region in Ohio, Milton B. Trautman 

 (1940) writes: "The first southbound migrants were noted during 

 the first half of September, and until the end of the month a rather 

 gradual, daily increase in numbers was observed. The migration 

 reached its peak in October, when the bird was as numerous as in 

 spring. In autumn its lisping note, uttered from overhead or from a 

 fence post or tree, was one of the most pleasing and familiar of all 

 fall bird calls. The Eastern Bluebird was very conspicuous during 

 the calm, warm 'Indian summer' days. of late October — such weather 

 was called 'bluebird weather' by local sportsmen." 



At Point Pelee, Ontario, the migration is often conspicuous; on 

 October 29, 1905, according to Taverner and Swales (1908), blue- 

 birds were there in numbers. "Here numbers were feeding on the 

 bare sand with the Prairie Horned Larks. It was in the waste clear- 

 ings beyond Gardner's place, however, that the greatest numbers 

 were found. Here they were in flocks almost as dense as blackbirds. 

 When flushed from the ground they generally flew to some of the 

 numerous clumps of bushes growing here and there in the open and, 

 when they lit and were viewed from a little distance, they were in 

 sufficient numbers to give the whole bush a decidedly blueish cast." 



Winter. — A few bluebirds spend the winter in southern New 

 England, especially in mild seasons and more commonly near the 

 seacoast, feeding on bayberries with the few wintering myrtle war- 

 blers or on the seeds of sumacs. They take shelter in the dense 

 growths of red cedars, which protect them from the cold winds and 

 furnish some berries for food. They roost in hollow trees or in bird 

 boxes, sometimes several together. Mr. Forbush (1929) cites Wil- 

 liam C. Wheeler, of Waltham, Mass., as having twice seen one go to 

 roost in an old robin's nest. Dr. Harold B. Wood writes to me that 



