BIRDS OF PENNSYLVANIA. 261 



trees and bushes. They sometimes visit towns and prey on English 

 Sparrows. Shrikes feed chiefly on grasshoppers and beetles, and when 

 these are not easily obtained they subsist on mice and small birds. The 

 Northern Shrike, assassin-like, will conceal himself in bushes and imi- 

 tate the cries of other birds, and when they come sufficiently near his 

 ainbush he will, to their great consternation, fly into their midst and 

 seize one of their number. 



Lanius ludovicianus LINN. 



Loggerhead Shrike ; Butcher-bird. 



DESCRIPTION (Plate 96}. 



Length about 9 ; extent 11^; wing 4 ; tail 4 ; tarsus 1.03 ; above slate colored ; scap- 

 ulars, rump and upper tail-coverts lighter ; below white ; pale grayish on sides ; 

 some specimens have lower parts partly waved with dusky lines, but others, especially 

 full plumaged adults lack these lines ; feathers about nostrils, lores, broad streak 

 back of eye, and below the eye also, bill and legs (old birds) black ; wings and tail 

 black ; tips of secondaries and basal half of primaries white ; and tail feathers are 

 marked with white as in borealis. The young and immature birds differ consider- 

 ably from the adult as above described, but they have a sufficient resemblance to be 

 identified by comparison with plate and description. 



Habitat. More southern portions of eastern United States ; north regularly to 

 southern Illinois, central Ohio, northwestern Pennsylvania, etc. In eastern and 

 central Pennsylvania this species and also excubitorides is seldom met with. 



The Loggerhead Shrike is a common summer resident from late in 

 April until about the middle of September, in Erie and Crawford coun- 

 ties. It is said to breed, sometimes, in Lawrence and Mercer counties ; 

 but in other sections of the state this bird, and also the White-rumped 

 Shrike, has been observed, so far as I can learn, only as an irregular 

 visitor during migrations, especially in the fall. The following remarks, 

 with relation to this Butcher-bird, as it is called in the Erie region, are 

 taken from my note book : " Erie city, May 20, 1889. To-day Mr. Geo. 

 B. Sennett and I drove out about three miles east of the city ; on the 

 road shot three adult shrikes (two males and female), and secured their 

 nests and young. Both nests were built in thorn trees ; one nest in a 

 field near the edge of a woods, contained four young, two or three days 

 old, and two eggs. This nest was placed eight feet from the ground, 

 and constructed of small twigs, dried grasses, and plant fibers with an 

 abundance of feathers and cotton. The other nest was situated about 

 four and a half feet from the ground, directly over a cow-path in a 

 meadow ; it had evidently been disturbed as it was insecurely placed, 

 being partly turned over. This nest, containing two half fledged males, 

 was composed almost entirely of plant-fiber and chicken feathers ; a few 

 small twigs only being on the outside ; measures inside of cavity four 

 and one-half inches wide and two and one-half inches in depth." 



" Erie, May 21, 1889. To-day Mr. Sennett and I found three nests of 

 shrikes east of the city, all were built in thorn or wild crab apple trees 



