WARBLERS 507 



30, 1906, saw seven and three respectively, (Mrs. S. R. Abbott, J. M. 0. S. 

 1907, p. 15). 



At the approach of warm weather the Myrtle Warblers enter 

 the State from their southern winter homes. Though a few 

 individuals have been recorded as regularly wintering near 

 Portland at Cape Elizabeth (Cf. Brownson, Journal Me. Orn. 

 Soc, March, 1905, pp. 27-28 and ibid. 1907, p. 27) this may 

 be attributed to peculiar local conditions. The first individuals 

 usually arrive in southern Maine about April fifteenth to April 

 22nd, and the usual time of appearance of the species at Bangor 

 is about April twenty-second to April thirtieth. The first indi- 

 viduals reach extreme northern Maine about May first. 

 Common throughout the State during the migration, the 

 individuals gradually diminish in numbers until by the tenth 

 of May practically none are to be found in southern Maine, 

 and, leaving a fair proportion of their numbers to nest in 

 northern, eastern and western Maine within Canadian faunal 

 limits, the tide of migration passes beyond our boundary. 



The scattered flocks pass on, leaving here and there a pair 

 of mated birds, in many instances individuals being found fre- 

 quenting the very same localities from year to year under 

 conditions which would almost warrant the assumption that 

 the very same individual birds had returned to their summer 

 homes. I have observed pairs of these birds which had seem- 

 ingly appeared over night in their well-known homes of the 

 previous year. They would hang around for a few days, and 

 by May fifteenth to twentieth begin nest building. Other indi- 

 vidual males who arrived with the moving throngs evidently 

 were seeking mates, for they made advances to the female 

 eontingency, hopping from twig to twig with outspread wings, 

 chipping and fluttering, now repulsed by the fair one, and now 

 accepted by another one to whom advances were made, to 

 finally spend a few days in a favorable spot and begin nest 

 building at a later date than others of their kind, who were 

 apparently old married folks. In spring and fall the call note 



