Extracts from Diary of Otto Widmann 65 



its center of distribution, is the Prairie Warbler. This 

 name was given the bird by AVilson in the early part of 

 the last century and was given on very slight acquaint- 

 ance. The bird is hardly ever seen on the prairie. A 

 more appropriate name would be Hillside Warbler; the 

 hillside is its real home, where its song is heard from the 

 time of its arrival about the middle of April through May 

 to the end of June. It has a peculiar song, strangely 

 resembling the notes of a young Quail when calling for 

 its mother. It consists of five notes, begins low and 

 grows louder with a strongly rising intonation. Its pecu- 

 liarity is such that it never fails to attract the attention 

 of everyone who has an ear for the voices of nature. 



Though not loud, the song has a far-reacliing quality 

 and it is often not easy to detect the source of the 

 sprightly strain even if the singer is not concealed, gen- 

 erally being perched on some eminence as the top of a 

 low tree or the highest branch of a shrub. Its home is 

 not in the forest, not among high trees, but in those 

 stretches of scrub oaks, so common in the Ozarks. It is 

 a neighbor of the Cardinal Redbird, the Yellow breasted 

 Chat, the Indigobird and Field Sparrow. It makes only 

 one brood in a year and places its neat little nest in a 

 bush or sapling, generally between two and five feet from 

 the ground. It leaves us in the latter part of September 

 and winters from southern Florida and the Bahamas 

 through the West Indies to Honduras. Above yellowish 

 green with a patch of chestnut in the middle of the back, 

 it might be called the Chestnut-backed Warbler. The 

 color of the lower parts, most often seen when singing, is 

 bright yellow with dark streaks along the sides of the 

 neck and body. Male and female differ but little, the yel- 

 low of the female being paler and the markings generally 

 duller. 



Another bird of special interest to the bird lover who 

 visits the Ozarks is the Blue Grosbeak, a southern bird 

 which finds its northern-most habitat in southern Mis- 



