THE CEDAR WAXWING. 285 
No. 126. 
CEDAR WAXWING. 
¥A.O. U. No. 619. Ampelis cedrorum ( Vieill.). 
Synonyms.—CEDAR-BIRD ; CHERRY-BIRD ; CAROLINA WAXWING. 
Description.—Adults: A conspicuous crest; extreme forehead, lores, and 
line through eye velvety-black; chin blackish, fading rapidly into the rich gray- 
ish-brown of remaining fore-parts and head; a narrow whitish line bordering the 
black on the forehead and the blackish of the chin; back darker, shading through 
ash of rump to blackish-ash of tail; tail-feathers abruptly tipped with gamboge 
yellow; belly sordid yellow; under tail-coverts white; wings slaty-gray, pri- 
maries narrowly edged with whitish; secondaries and inner quills without white 
markings, but bearing tips of red “sealing-wax”’; the tail-feathers are occasion- 
ally found with the same curious, horny appendages; bill black; feet plumbeous. 
Sexes alike, but considerable individual variation in number and size of waxen 
tips. Young, streaked everywhere with whitish, and usually without red tips. 
Length 6.50-7.50 (165.1-190.5) ; wing 3.70 (94. ) ; tail 2.31 (58.7) ; bill .40 (10.2). 
Recognition Marks.—Sparrow size; soft grayish-brown plumage; crest; 
red sealing-wax tips on secondaries; belly yellow; wings without white bars 
or spots, as distinguished from preceding species. 
Nest, a bulky affair of leaves, grasses, bark-strips and trash, well lined with 
rootlets and soft materials; placed in crotch or horizontally saddled on limb of 
orchard or evergreen tree. Eggs, 3-6, dull grayish blue or putty-color, marked 
sparingly with deep-set, rounded spots of umber or black. Av. size, .86x .61 
(Birks xe WHS). 
General Range.—North America at large, from the Fur Countries south- 
ward. In winter from the northern border of the United States south to the West 
Indies and Costa Rica. Breeds from Virginia, Kentucky, Kansas, etc., northward. 
Range in Ohio.—Of regular occurrence in the State, but irregular or var- 
iable locally. Resident, but less common in winter. 
ONE does not care to commit himself in precise language upon the range 
of the Cedar-bird, or to predict that it will be found at any given spot in a 
given season. The fact is Cedar-birds are gypsies of the feathered kind. There 
are always some of them about somewhere, but their comings and goings are 
not according to any fixed law. A company of Cedar-birds may throng the 
barren maples in your front yard some bleak day in December; they may nest 
in your orchard the following July; and you may not see them on your 
premises again for years—unless you keep cherry trees. It must be confessed 
(since the shade of the cherry tree is ever sacred to Truth) that the Cedar- 
bird, or “Cherry-bird,” has a single passion, a consuming desire for cherries. 
But don’t kill him for that. You like cherries yourself. All the more reason 
then why you should be charitable toward a brother’s weakness. Besides he 
is so handsome, handsomer himself than a luscious cherry even. Feast your 
