290 BULLETIN 197, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



lected at Flatts, Bermuda, on March 24, 1931 ; another was collected 

 in Nevada at Crystal Spring, Pahranagat Valley, Lincoln County, on 

 May 29, 1932. 



Egg dates. — Arkansas : 3 records, April 24 to July 4. 



Massachusetts : 19 records. May 16 to June 14 ; 14 records, May 30 

 to June 9, indicating the height of the season. 



New York: 20 records. May 24 to June 30; 16 records. May 31 to 

 June 14. 



VIREO SOLITARIUS SOLITARIUS (Wilson) 



BLUE-HEADED VIREO 



HABITS 



The yellow-throated vireo may be more brilliantly colored, with 

 its bright yellow throat, but, to my mind, the subject of this sketch is 

 the handsomest of the vireos. His gray-blue head is accented by a 

 pair of pure-white spectacles, eye rings, and loral stripes ; in marked 

 contrast are his olive-green back, his pure-white throat and breast, 

 and his yellow sides. The soft color tones combine to make a most 

 charming picture of pleasing loveliness. He appears to be a well- 

 groomed aristocrat among birds. In addition, his song is delight- 

 fully rich and varied, to which we always stop and listen. And his 

 gentle, trustful manners, as we try to stroke him on the nest, have 

 endeared him to all who know him. He is a lovely and a lovable bird. 



I had seen the blue-headed vireo as a migrant in southeastern Mas- 

 sachusetts, but it was some years before I came to know it as a breed- 

 ing bird; this was mainly because I did not Imow where to look for it, 

 until one of my rivals in egg collecting reported finding a nest in a 

 grove of white pines {Pinus strobus). Since then we have learned to 

 look for it in the white-pine woods, with which this section of the 

 State is well supplied. It is a forest-loving bird, and we practically 

 never find it breeding anywhere but in woods where these pines or 

 hemlocks make solid stands or at least predominate; often, however, 

 such woods contain scattering growths of gray birches, wild apple 

 trees, or sapling hardwoods of various kinds, in which the vireos like 

 to build their nests. 



It may be purely accidental, but it is an interesting fact that we 

 have often found the blue-headed vireo nesting in a tract of pines 

 occupied by a pair of breeding Cooper's hawks; I find six such cases 

 recorded in my notes, and once the vireo's nest was within 50 feet of 

 the occupied hawk's nest ; but we have never found this vireo nesting 

 in similar woods where sharp-shinned hawks were breeding. We 

 never saw anything to indicate that the Cooper's hawks ever harmed 

 the vireos, or their young, but it might have been different with the 

 sharpshins! Perhaps the vireos have learned to trust the larger 



