American Robin 673 



the plumage of the adult is never spotted above or below, the ordinary colors 

 being nearly uniform black (in males of some species only), brown, slate-gray, 

 etc. They are widely but somewhat peculiarly distributed, about fifty of the 

 one hundred and fifteen forms occurring in the New World south of Mexico, 

 some twenty-five in Africa, and the remainder widely spread over Europe, Asia, 

 and the Pacific islands. They are mainly terrestrial birds, frequenting meadows 

 and fields in search of grubs and various insects, but they also subsist to a 

 considerable extent on fruits, berries, and seeds. Perhaps the best-known is 

 the so-called Blackbird (P. merula) of Europe generally, south of the Arctic 

 Circle, whence it ranges as far as Syria, Egypt, Persia, and the Azores. About 

 ten inches long, the male has the entire plumage deep black, with the bill and 

 the orbits of the eyes orange-yellow, while the female is sooty brown. In the 

 western portions of its range it comes as a summer visitor only, but otherwise it 

 is a resident species or merely shifts its quarters to less exposed situations in the 

 winter. Frequenting woods and groves, but more especially lawns, gardens, 

 and cultivated fields, it is one of the most familiar of European birds, its clear, 

 loud, melodious song endearing it to most people. It feeds on snails (the shells 

 of which it breaks against a stone), insects, grubs, and earthworms, but during 

 the fruit season becomes more or less troublesome to the gardener, greedily 

 devouring cherries, currants, gooseberries, strawberries, etc. The nesting 

 season extends from March to June, according to latitude, and two or three and 

 sometimes as many as four broods are reared in a season. The nest, a rather 

 large structure of twigs, roots, and coarse grass cemented together with mud 

 and lined with softer grasses, is placed in a hedge-bush, evergreen tree, wall, or 

 sometimes on the ground; the four to six eggs are light greenish blue spotted 

 with reddish brown. The Blackbird was successfully introduced into Australia 

 in 1864, especially in the vicinity of Melbourne. 



American Robin. We must not omit full mention of the American Robin 

 (P. migratorius), which is beyond question the most abundant and best-known 

 of all our Thrushes, ranging throughout eastern North America to the Rocky 

 Mountains, including eastern Mexico and Alaska, and nesting from Virginia 

 and Kansas northward to the Arctic coast. The majority spend the winter 

 throughout the Southern States, but a few more hardy or venturesome than their 

 fellows are found at this season in the dense swamps of the Northern States 

 and even southern Canada. In western North America, from the eastern base v 

 of the Rocky Mountains westward and south to Lower California and the table- 

 lands of Mexico, the place is taken by the Western Robin ( P. m. propinqua), 

 which differs mainly in the absence of a white tip to the outer tail-feathers. 



As Mr. Henry Nehrling well says: "None of our birds has become so es- 

 teemed a favorite with the American people as the Robin. The Pilgrim Fathers 

 of Massachusetts called this Thrush the Robin, or Robin Redbreast, because 

 it reminded them of the affectionate and beloved Robin of their English home, 

 and the love of the latter bird together with its name passed over to the somewhat 

 similarly colored Thrush of their new country." It appears to have been origi- 

 nally a true forest bird, but with the advent of civilization it abandoned in large 



