WARBLERS 489 



are merely spotted with no indications of being wreathed, but in 

 mine the spots and blotches tend to aggregate into a rather open 

 wreath about the larger ends and a few spots are scattered over 

 the surface, being on the average smaller and fewer toward the 

 smaller ends. The eggs measure 0.65 x 0.54, 0.65 x 0.53, 0.69 

 X 0.56, 0.63 X 0.54. Nest building in Maine commences as early 

 as May fifteenth, sometimes even earlier, and full sets of four or 

 five eggs are found by May twenty-fifth to the thirtieth 

 and occasionally belated layings as late as the middle of June. 

 Unless found while the female is building, the nest can usually 

 be located only by flushing the incubating female from directly 

 under your feet. I am not prepared to state what aid the 

 male gives in building or in the task of incubation, but he is 

 generally in the vicinity to respond and add his voice to the 

 tumult when the female is disturbed, and he also helps feed 

 tne young. 



The call notes of this species are quite variable, generally 

 the alarm note being a "tsip" or "chick." Mr. Minot gives 

 the alarm note as "chick-a-chick, chick-chick" and describes 

 the song as "wee-see, wee-see, wee-see, wee-see, wee-see." Mr. 

 Burns has recorded the migrating song as "A thin wiry sibilant 

 of repeated syllables, or a series of double syllables, ending 

 in both cases with two shorter syllables. The one type repre- 

 sented by the syllables "tse tse tse te te" and the other by 

 "ki-tse ki-tse ki-tse se se" (Burns, Warbler Songs, p. 22). 

 My observation of the ordinary song would incline me to the 

 following syllables "zie-zie-zie-tity." 



Genus PROTONOTARIA Baird. 



637. Protonotaria citrea (Bodd.). Prothonotary Warbler. 



Plumage of adult male : rump bluish gray ; back greenish or olive yellow ; 

 wings and tail blackish, edged with ashy so as to have a general ashy 

 appearance ; inner webs of some tail feathers white ; head, neck and under 

 parts lemon yellow, deepest on crown, paler on belly. Plumage of adult 

 female : the yellow parts paler and with whiter area on belly. Immature 



