64 YELLOW WARBLER. 



time in Au.c;ust, appears in a line down the throat that divides en the breast and 

 passes along the sides ; this being brighter than the first plumage gives the birds 

 a singular appearance, for the^ look almost exactly as if they had on yellow neck- 

 ties. 



Dimensions. Length, 5.00; stretch, 7.55; Aving. 2.35; tail, 1.90: bill, 

 ..')5 ; tarsus, .80. 



Comparisons. Readily known by the prevailing yellow color and absence 

 of very dark markings: in short, this is the most yellow of all our warblers. 



Nests and Eggs. Nests, compact structures, placed in trees and bushes, 

 composed of grasses, hempen fibers of plants and cotton, to which is often added 

 the reddish-brown covering of the cinnamon fern ; lined with very fine grasses, 

 horse-hair and cotton. Eggs, four or five, bluish or grayish white, s])otted and 

 blotched, often irregularly, with reddish-brown and lilac, generally more thick- 

 ly on the larger end, where the spots are sometimes fused together to form a ring. 

 Dimensions, .65 by .45. 



Fig. 37. 



Head and outer tail feather cf Yellow Warbler. 



Gexekal Habits. The Yellow War])ler was formerly 

 a very common summer visitor to the whole of the more open 

 sections of New Eng-land. Althongh still common in places 

 where the native shrubbery is allowed to grow undisturbed, I 

 am sorry that I have to state that I notice a sensible diminu- 

 tion in the numbers of this pretty and interesting warbler in 

 the immediate vicinity of the towns and cities of eastern Mass- 

 achusetts; th's decrease being" wholly due to the remo>al of 

 nuich of the native shrubbery, which once grew so abundant- 



