ARKANSAS KINGBIRD 63 



Mrs. Irene G. ^Vlieelock (1904) says of the young: 



At first ihey iirrj fed by regurgitation, but after the third day large insects 

 are torn apart and given fresh. Fourteen crickets in ten minutes was the 

 record of one busy forager. • • • 



In two weeks the babies have grown so that they overflow thu nest, and 

 one balances himself outside. And now his lessons begin. As soon as he has 

 learned to use his wings he is taught to catch his food in the same way in 

 which he must obtain it all his life. I have seen the parent bring a dragon- 

 fly or other insect, alight with it opposite above the young bird, and call his 

 attention to it in a peculiar low^ twitter. Then, when quite ready, he releases 

 fhe prey, which half falls, half flutters, downward. Nearly always the nestling 

 is out after it and back with it in his beak before you can realize how it is 

 done. Many times we have watched them, and the lesson is always given in this 

 way. and always repeated until there can be no fear of missing. Then the 

 young are taken to the meadows and taught to dart down after butterflies or 

 grasshoppers. In some way they learn that the worker bees have stings and 

 must not be caught, but that the drones are delicious morsels. 



Plumages. — I have not seen the natal do^Yn, which is probably 

 gray, as in the eastern kingbird. The juvenal plumage is largely 

 acquired before the young bird leaves the nest, except that the wings 

 and tail are not fully grown. In this plumage the sexes are alike, 

 and both lack the orange crown patch; the crown is "pale smoke 

 gray" with pale edgings, the back "ecru-olive," the rump and upper 

 tail coverts pale "clove brown"; the tail is dull black, tipped with 

 pale brownish, and the outer webs of the outer rectrices are white; 

 the wings are pale "clove brown," with yellowish white edgings; the 

 throat and chest are "pale smoke gray," and the abdomen is "empire 

 yellow"; the first primary is not attenuated. 



This plumage is worn through the summer and most of the fall; 

 I have seen birds in this plumage that do not show much sign of 

 molt even in November; one, taken November 19, still wears the 

 juvenal plumage, but the wings and tail are somewhat worn, as if 

 there was to be a complete postjuvenal molt. Usuall\ the post- 

 juvenal molt is accomplished mainly in October and November, and 

 the first winter plumage is assumed, in which old and young birds 

 become indistinguishable; the orange crown ])atch is acquired and 

 the three outer primaries are attenuated at their tips. There is, ap- 

 parently, a partial molt of the body plumage in March and April, 

 a few new feathers showing among the older, faded ones of the 

 winter plumage. There is a complete postnuptial molt in August 

 and September. 



Food. — Professor Beal (1912) in his study of the food of the 

 Arkansas kingbird, examined the contents of 109 stomachs and 

 reports that — 



The food is found to consist of 90.61 per cent of animal matter to 9.39 per 

 cent of vegetable. Of the animal portion, Hymonoptera (bees and wasps'*. 



