332 BULLETIN 15 5, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Resident; common. 



The mockingbird is both widely distributed and easily seen so 

 that it is one of the prominent birds found on the island. It fre- 

 quents open brush, or the borders of fields and pastures where there 

 is a cover of thicket in which it may find shelter, but does not pene- 

 trate into heavy forest, though it may occur wherever there are little 

 clearings. It is found abundantly all through the lowland regions 

 of the island and is ubiquitous so that there is no necessity for citing 

 localities at which it has been recorded. Wetmore found it abundant 

 on the open slopes at Kenskoff and Furcy and observed it on the 

 north slope of Morne La Selle to an elevation of 1600 meters but 

 did not see it on the high summit of the range. It was not recorded 

 in the mountain valleys about Constanza and El Rio but may pos- 

 sibly occur there in small numbers as all conditions there except the 

 cold of the night air are favorable to it. Abbott secured it on Tortue 

 and Gonave Islands, and Danforth and Poole and Perrygo took it 

 on the latter. The species is especially common in semi-arid sec- 

 tions grown with cactus, mesquite and logwood. 



In traveling along country roads or trails one frequently observes 

 a slender, long-tailed bird with gray back and white breast that 

 shows a broad mark of white in the dark wings as it flies across in 

 front of car, horse or pedestrian, or rises with slowly flapping wings 

 to sing in the air above its haunt of thorny thickets. This is the 

 mockingbird, ruiseiior, or rossignol, according to the language that 

 one speaks. The song, clear and pleasing, is at its height in April 

 and May, and the birds may then be heard on all sides. Their notes 

 are similar to those of the mockingbird of the mainland, famous for 

 its powers of mimicry, but the Hispaniolan race does not imitate 

 other birds so constantly as its northern relative, principally because 

 there are few species in its haunts with striking notes. Wetmore 

 heard the mocker giving the song of the common vireo (Vireo oliva- 

 ceus olivaceus) regularly, and occasionally copying the note of the 

 gray kingbird, but no other species. The song is thus more truly 

 that of the mockingbird than that heard in other regions. Vieillot 

 many years ago noted this peculiarity as he observed that in Haiti 

 this form is not a mimic, but in this he was not altogether correct 

 as is indicated above. The species is recorded by many of the early 

 travelers who wrote of the island from the days of Columbus and 

 Oviedo, sufficient indication of the prominent place that it takes in 

 the landscape. 



At Baie des Moustiques W. L. Abbott secured a set of three eggs 

 May 8, 1917 which have the ground color paler than pale glaucous 

 green and are spotted heavily with army, cameo, and vandyke brown, 

 large spots occurring over the entire surface but concentrating about 

 the large end to form a broad, poorly defined wreath. Two of these 



