[ 474 ] BIRDSOFOREGON 



Russet-backed Thrush: 



Hylocichla ustulata ustulata (Nuttall) 



DESCRIPTION. "Upper parts olive brown, wings and tail often browner; buffy eye ring 

 distinct- sides of head tinged with tawny; chest pale buff, whitish in summer, 

 marked with narrow triangular spots; under parts white, sides tinged with olive 

 brown. Length: 6.90-7.60, wing 3.60-4.00, tail 1.80-3.30, bill .50-. 60." (Bailey) 

 Nest: In bushes or low in tree, compact mass of mosses and shreds of bark (Plate 

 81, A). Eggs: 4 or 5, pale greenish blue, spotted with rusty. 



DISTRIBUTION. General: Breeds from Juneau, Alaska, to southern California. 

 Winters from Mexico south . In Oregon: Common summer resident of western Oregon 

 to and including summit forests of Cascades and Klamath Lake district. 



ONE OF THE characteristic summer birds of the fir forests of the Willamette 

 Valley foothills as well as those along the summit of the Cascades and 

 the coast districts is the Russet-backed Thrush (Plate 81, A). Heard in 

 those somber forests, its beautiful eerie song brings the spirit of the 

 wilderness as few other sounds can. Heard either as the early morning 

 light first begins to penetrate the gloomy shadows or in the gathering 

 twilight of a golden orange sunset, it carries a spiritual quality found 

 only among these soft-colored songsters. The bird itself is only a brown 

 shadow among a hundred other shadows, though if one enters a salmon- 

 berry thicket and remains quiet long enough to be forgotten, some of the 

 shadows will begin to move independently and reveal the soft-brown 

 bird with breast beautifully marked with irregular spots of brown. 



The type specimen came from the "forests of the Columbia River," 

 now considered by the American Ornithologists' Union to mean Fort 

 Vancouver, Washington, although Nuttall (1840) stated the type was 

 taken June 10, 1835, at Fort William. Cooper (Cooper and Suckley 1860) 

 wrote that the bird arrived on the Columbia River May i, 1854, and that 

 eggs were found June 15 to July 13, 1854. Johnson (1880) reported it for 

 the Willamette Valley. Merrill (1888) found a few at Fort Klamath, in- 

 cluding a nest with four eggs, June 8, 1887. Woodcock (1901) included 

 eight Willamette Valley and coast stations, including nesting dates at 

 Portland, June 19, 1894, and June xo and 2.1, 1895, furnished by H. T. 

 Bohlman. Since these publications, there have been numerous references 

 to the species in western Oregon, where it arrives in April (earliest date, 

 April 2.4, Multnomah County) and remains until September (latest date, 

 September 2.2,, Clatsop County). Our own records cover practically every 

 county in that part of the State, the farthest-east specimen being one from 

 Fish Lake on the southeast base of Mount McLoughlin, Jackson County, 

 June 12., 19x1 (Gabrielson Collection). This lake is only a few miles from 

 Upper Klamath Lake and Fort Klamath where Merrill made his breeding 

 record. 



Numerous nesting records in our notes and the files of the Biological 

 Survey show nests with fresh eggs to be most frequent about mid-June, 

 the extreme dates being May 30 and July 15. 



