340 FLYCATCHERS 



had nothing to do, he is keenly awake to every movement about him, 

 and every few minutes he dashes into the air, seizes a passing insect, 

 and returns to the spot from which he started. While his mate is 

 sitting, he usually establishes himself near the nesting tree, and spends 

 hour after hour in this apparently monotonous way, varying it only to 

 relieve her by watching the nest, and thus give her an opportunity to 

 seek food for herself. I never saw a Kingbird either assist in brooding 

 or carry food to his mate, but his manners to her are most affection- 

 ate, and he is untiring in his labors in the feeding of the young. 



This bird is accused of being quarrelsome and aggressive to other 

 birds, and his scientific name means Tyrant Flycatcher, but in my 

 study of his ways I have found him less aggressive than are most birds 

 in the neighborhood of their nest. With the exception of the Crow, 

 against whom he seems to have a special grudge, I have never seen a 

 Kingbird take notice of any bird unless he alighted near his nest, and 

 the meekest creature that wears feathers will try to drive away stran- 

 gers who approach that sacred spot. 



The calls and cries of the Kingbird are generally loud and attract- 

 ive, if not particularly musical, but while his mate is sitting and pos- 

 sibly at other times he indulges in a soft and very pleasing song, 

 which I have heard only in the very early morning. 



OLIVE THORNE MILLER. 



1905. HERRICK, F. H., Home-Life of Wild Birds, 49-55. 



445. Tyrannus dominicensis dominicensis (GmeL). GRAY KING- 

 BIRD. Ads. Above ashy gray; an orange-red crown patch; wings and tail 

 fuscous; under wing-coverts pale sulphur-yellow; underparts white, tinged 

 with grayish on the breast. L., 9'00; W., 4'60; T., 3'50; B. from N., '80. 



Range. Breeds from Ga., se. S. C., Fla., and Yucatan through the 

 Bahamas and West Indies to n. S. A.; winters from Jamaica and Haiti 

 southward; accidental in Mass. 



Nest, of grass and weeds, lined with fine grass and rootlets, in trees. 

 Eggs, 4, deep salmon, irregularly spotted and blotched with umber and 

 lilac, I'OO x "75 (Maynard). Date, Little Sarasota, Fla., May 15. 



The Gray Kingbird is a common summer resident of parts of our 

 South Atlantic States, arriving early in May. It resembles the King- 

 bird in appearance, but lacks the white band at the end of the tail, 

 and has quite different notes. Its usual call is a vigorous pitirri, pitlrri, 

 which, in Cuba, gives it its common name. 



The ARKANSAS KINGBIRD (44? Tyrannus verticalis), a western species, 

 breeds mainly in Sonoran zones, from s. B. C., s. Alberta, and s. Sask., s. 

 to n. Lower Calif, and Chihuahua, e. to w. Minn., w. Iowa, cen. Kans., and 

 w. Tex.; winters from w. Tex. to Guatemala; casual in Man.; accidental 

 in Mo., Wise., Maine, N. Y., N. J., and Md. 



Washington, one record, Sept. 30. 



The FORK-TAILED FLYCATCHER (44- Muscivora tyrannus], a South 

 American species rarely found north of southern Mexico and the southern 

 Lesser Antilles, has been recorded from Mississippi, Kentucky, New Jersey, 

 Maine and Bermuda. 



