The Tovvnsend's Warbler {Deudroica townsendl) 



By H. S. Keller 



l.cnnth : 5' J inches. 



Dr. Robert Ridgeway, in the Ornithology of Illinois, uses the following words 

 in sjjeaking of that family of birds called the American Warblers (Mniotilidae), 

 "No group of birtls more deserves the epithet of pretty than the Warblers; Tan- 

 agers are splendid ; Humming-birds are refulgent ; other kinds are brilliant, gaudy 

 or magnificent, \m\ Warblers alone are pretty in the jmiper and full sense of that 

 term." 



As they arc full of nervous activity, and are "eminenll_\- migratory birds," they 

 seem to flit rather than fly through the L'nited States as they pass northward in 

 the spring to their breeding places, and southward in the fall to their winter homes 

 among the luxuriant forests and plantations of the tropics. All the species are 

 purely American, and as they fly from one extreme to the other of their migratory 

 range they remain l)ut a few days in any intermediate locality. Time seems U) 

 be an important matter with them. It would seem as if every moment of daylight 

 was used in the gathering of food and the night hours in continuing their journey. 



The American Warblers include more than one hundred species grouped in 

 about twenty genera. Of these species nearly three-fourths are represented in 

 North America at least as summer visitants, the remaining species frequeting 

 oidv the tropics. Though woodland birds, they exhibit luany and widely separated 

 modes of life, some of the species preferring only aquatic regions, while others 

 seek drier soils. Some make their homes in shrubby places, while others are 

 seldom found except in forests. As their food is practically confined to insects, 

 they frequent our lawns and orchards during their migrations, when they fly in 

 companies which may include several species, Mr. Chapman, in his Handbook 

 of Birds of Eastern North America, says, "Some species flit actively from branch 

 to branch, taking their prey from the more exposed parts of the twigs and leaves ; 

 others are gleaners, and carefully explore the under surfaces of leaves or crevices 

 in the bark ; while several, like Flycatchers, capture a large part of their food on the 

 wing." 



The Townsend's Warbler is ;i native of Western North America, especially 

 near the Pacific coast. Its range extends from Sitka on the north to Central 

 America on the south, where it appears during the winter. In its migration it 

 wanders as far east as Colorado. It breeds from the southern border of the 

 United States northward, nesting in regions of cone-liearing trees. It is said 

 that the nest of this Warbler is usually placed at a considerable height, though at 

 times as low as from five to fifteen feet from the ground. The nest is built of 

 strips of fibrous bark, twigs, long grasses and wool, compactly ^voven together. 

 This is lined with hair, vegetable down and feathers. 



The eggs are described as bufify white, speckled and spotted with reddish 

 brown and lilac-gray, about three-fifths of an inch in length by about one-half of 

 an inch in diameter. 



532 



