Catbird 689 



Catbird. Like the last the Catbird (Galeoscoptes carolinensis) is the sole 

 tenant of its genus, and is an abundant and familiar summer visitor throughout 

 the eastern United States, journeying in winter to Cuba and Central America. 

 The vernacular name is derived from its mewing notes, which resemble more 

 or less closely the cry of a domestic cat. Its plumage, too, is severely plain, 

 being slaty gray with cap and tail black and under tail-coverts reddish chestnut ; 

 in fact, as Dr. Coues is pleased to put it, the Catbird represents the dead level 

 of bird life, "inseparable from home and homely things; he reflects, and is 

 reflected, in domestic life." Yet to many therein lies his chief charm, for, if 

 unmolested, he comes fearlessly and confidently about houses and lawns, gardens 

 and orchards, and, Mr. Ridgway adds, "very incomplete an American orchard 

 would seem without him." But there is among many, chiefly ignorant, people 

 a decided prejudice against the Catbird, probably not so much on account of 

 his occasionally stealing cherries as that his cat-like notes are distinctly dis- 

 tasteful. He has, however, a distinctive and really very sweet song of his own 

 in addition to harsh discordant notes and crude imitations of other birds. 



The Catbird usually returns from the south in May, and in addition to orchards 

 and gardens frequents bushy swamps, tangled thickets, and undergrowth along 

 streams. It is rather weak on the wing, avoiding long flights over open spaces 

 and flitting from bush to bush, keeping as much as possible in cover. Its food 

 consists almost entirely of insects, which are mainly secured on the ground. The 

 nest is a large, rather inartistic structure of twigs, grasses, and leaves, lined with 

 rootlets, and is placed in a densely foliaged bush, hedge, or tangle, usually 

 only three or four feet from the ground, and is easily discovered by the evident 

 anxiety of the birds. The eggs, from three to five in number, are a rich bluish 

 green. Usually two broods are reared in a season, and by the last of September 

 or early October they all depart for their winter quarters. 



Thrashers. The remaining genus comprises only the Thrashers (Toxostoma, 

 formerly Harporhynchus), of which nearly twenty forms are recognized. The 

 word Thrasher or Thrusher as sometimes used is thought to be derived from 

 Thrush, the corruption being perhaps a "comparative degree," since they are 

 much larger than the true Thrushes, being in fact the largest of the American 

 slender-billed oscinine birds. They are largely terrestrial, having long, stout 

 tarsi and large feet, with short, much-rounded wings and large, rounded tails, 

 while the bill is as long as, or much longer than, the head and more or less 

 decurved. The coloration is principally reddish brown or brownish gray above 

 and whitish or buffy below, usually with distinct but sometimes nearly obsolete 

 darker spots or streaks; in length they range mainly between ten and twelve 

 inches. Their center of distribution is in the southwestern United States, whence 

 they spread southward through Mexico and westward to southern and Lower 

 California, only a single species inhabiting the great area between the eastern 

 base of the Rocky Mountains and the Atlantic. This eastern species, called 

 the Brown Thrasher (T. rufum), is a well-known though not very familiar bird, 

 being much oftener heard than seen. It prefers hedgerows, shrubby borders 

 of upland woods, and thickets in dry fields, where it spends much of its time 



