Birds of Indiana. 1091 



chestnut, purplish, lilac-gray or viuaceous and black, principally con- 

 fined to larger end'; .77 by .58, .fil by .50, .63 by .48; average, .67 

 by .52. 



Common summer resident throughout the State, where it frequents 

 the tall grasses, sedges and shrubbery about the swamps and damp 

 places and along the ^'alleys of streams. The first migrants arrive 

 from April 15 to 27, southward, and from April 19 to 

 May 17, northward. The males come first, ' and, while most 

 of them seek their favorite tangles and low thickets, some 

 wander away to the hillsides and uplands. They have been recorded 

 as first arriving at Bicknell, April 17, 1896, 1897; Greencastle, April 

 17, 1896, April 28, 1894; Frankfort, April 17, 1896, May 16, 1895; 

 Wabash, April 15, 1893; Brookville, April 18, 1883, 1896, May 5, 

 1882; Greensburg, April 18, 1896, April 28, 1894; Sedan, April 19, 

 1889, April 30, 1887, 1897; Petersburg, Mich., April 27. 1888, May 

 5, 1889, 1897; Chicago, 111., April 27, 1896, May 17, 1884. Their 

 characteristic voice betokens their coming. It is distinct and penetrat- 

 ing and carries to quite a distance. The song reminds one of one of 

 the well known utterances of the Carolina Wren (T. ludovicianus ) , 

 but the difference is easily recognized, and, with care, one can not be 

 deceived. It may be said that all songs are not alike. There is quite 

 a difference in them, when close to the singer, but when one is some 

 distance away, a note may be missed, and the song would be recorded 

 on the memory without it. The common interpretation of the song 

 of the Maryland Yellow-throat is wicliity, wichity, wichity. I find 

 many of them, sometimes all in a locality, saying wit-ti-chee, wit-ti- 

 cliee, wit-ti-chee. It sounds plainly at a distance of twenty feet. A 

 call that came to me from three hundred feet away was plainly 

 wi-cliee, ivi-chee, ivi-cliee, ivi-chee, uttered in a fine, clear voice. After 

 June their voices are not so commonly heard. Though they drop out 

 of the sounds of the neighborhood, they are not entirely gone, for one 

 is heard now and then, perhaps as long as they remain. 



I have found them paired by May (1885) and often with full sets 

 of eggs by the latter part of that month. Prof. B. W. Evermann 

 found a nest, with five fresh eggs, in Carroll County, May 22, 1883, 

 and June 12, 1880, found young able to fiy. Sometimes they rear 

 two broods. In August they begin to leave and often are gone by 

 the middle of September. Other years they remain until October. 

 The latest dates fi-om the following places are: Sedan, Septembr 16, 

 1894; Brookville, September 10, 1885; Bicknell, October 5, 1896; 

 Warren County, September 25, 1897; Greensburg, October 10, 1896. 



Mr. E. E. Quick has in his collection a three-storv nest of this bird. 



