Gbe Warbler 77 



to photograph this most unusual nest which contained eggs that were hatch- 

 ing at a most unusual date. Five days later, on April 25th, I again visited 

 the nest with a view to photographing the young birds, but when I reached 

 it there was nothing to be seen but the egg shells and a considerable quantity 

 of feathers, both large and small. Evidently the parent bird had been cap- 

 tured on the nest by some four-footed or sharp-taloned marauder. 



The Tolmie Warbler in Wyoming 



(Geothlypis tolmiei) 



By P. B. Peabody 



N brush-grown canyon bottoms, amid the aspens, on hawthorn- 

 studded hillsides amid masses of poison oak, and amid thickets 

 of wild gooseberry along the creek-sides — here haunt the Tolmie 

 Warblers. (If you are a gentleman of leisure, call them Mac 

 Gillivray's). 



The Geothlypis races are sharply distinguished from other ground 

 Warblers by striking mutual similarities, yet each has its own traits. As 

 one might conjecture, the Tolmie Warbler has many points of habit in 

 common with its cousin, the wearer of crape. It loves the thickets for its 

 haunting and its feeding, though the nests are placed, as a rule, in more open 

 situations. It is both restless and familiar, noisy and whilomly silent, and 

 it makes a deal of fuss, when man is about, after its young have burst their 

 bonds. 



The male Tolmie is a most fascinating creature. He pipes, restlessly, 

 amid the undergrowth, his u jillis-jillis-jillis,-whittle,-z^///7 < ?", varying his 

 ditty with an occasional laconic "jit", especially if a human intruder be near. 

 And when you chance to sight him, — which you are able to do, if expert and 

 wary, about once in a life-time, — he seems to bear about with him the 

 consciousness of his rich, quiet beauty in all the elements of his bearing, 

 even to the flirting of his tail. 



As with the Mourning Warbler in Northern Minnesota, so with this 

 member of the genus in Wyoming, the arrival is late, in spring, and the 

 coming fairly simultaneous. The habit is greatly local, and a pair, once 

 located, would seem seldom to leave the immediate environ of their chosen 

 summer home. As with its near relative, the nesting of the Tolmie Warbler 

 follows soon after its arrival. By June 10, as a rule, the nests are finished and 

 the sets complete. In Crook and Weston Counties, Wyoming, sets of five would 

 seem to predominate, though layings of four seem common. Nearly one- 

 half the nests found have contained four eggs. The nests are normally of 



