Conspicuously Black and White 



It is generally seen in the underbrush, picking about among the 

 dead leaves for its steady diet of earthworms and larvae of in- 

 sects, occasionally regaling itself with a few dropping berries 

 and fruit. 



When startled, the bird rises not more than ten or twelve 

 feet from the earth, and utters its characteristic calls. On ac- 

 count of this habit of flying low and grubbing among the leaves, 

 it is sometimes called the ground robin. In the South our modest 

 and useful little food-gatherer is often called grasel, especially in 

 Louisiana, where it is white-eyed, and is much esteemed, alas! 

 by epicures. 



Snowflake 



(Plectropbenax nivalis) Finch family 



Called also: SNOW BUNTING; WHITEBIRD ; SNOWBIRD; 

 SNOW LARK 



Length 7 to 7. 5 inches. About one-fourth smaller than the robin. 



Male and Female Head, neck, and beneath soiled white, with a 

 few reddish-brown feathers on top of head, and suggesting an 

 imperfect collar. Above, grayish brown obsoletely streaked 

 with black, the markings being most conspicuous in a band 

 between shoulders. Lower tail feathers black ; others, white 

 and all edged with white. Wings brown, white, and gray. 

 Plumage unusually variable. In summer dress (in arctic 

 regions) the bird is almost white. 



Range Circumpolar regions to Kentucky (in winter only). 



Migrations Midwinter visitor; rarely, if ever, resident south of 

 arctic regions. 



These snowflakes (mentioned collectively, for it is impossible 

 to think of the bird except in great flocks) are the "true spirits of 

 the snowstorm," says Thoreau. They are animated beings that 

 ride upon it, and have their life in it. By comparison with the 

 climate of the arctic regions, no doubt our hardiest winter weather 

 seems luxuriously mild to them. We associate them only with 

 those wonderful midwinter days when sky, fields, and woods 

 alike are white, and a "hard, dull bitterness of cold" drives 

 every other bird and beast to shelter. It is said they often pass 

 the night buried beneath the snow. They have been seen to dive 

 beneath it to escape a hawk. 



Whirling about in the drifting snow to catch the seeds on 

 59 



