Conspicuously Yellow and Orange 



repeated over and over again with a persistency worthy of a 

 Kentucky warbler. It is delivered from a perch within a few feet 

 of the ground, as high as the bird seems ever inclined to ascend. 



Nashville Warbler 



( Helminthophila ruficapilla) Wood Warbler family 



Length— 4.-] sio 5 inches. About an inch and a half smaller than 

 the bnglish sparrow. 



^«/^— Olive-green above; yellow underneath. Slate-gray head 

 and neck. Partially concealed chestnut patch on crown. 

 Wmgs and tail olive-brown and without markings. 



J^emale-DnW olive and paler, with brownish wash underneath. 



Hange—'HorXh America, westward to the plains; north to the Fur 

 Coantries, and south to Central America and Mexico. Nests 

 north of Ilhnois and northern New England ; winters in 

 tropics. 



Migrations— k^xW. September or October. 



It must not be thought that this beautiful warbler confines 

 Itself to backyards in the city of Nashville simply because Wil- 

 scn discovered it near there and gave it a local name, for the 

 bird's actual range reaches from the fur trader's camp near Hud- 

 son Bay to the adobe villages of Mexico and Central America, 

 and over two thousand miles east and west in the United States.' 

 It chooses open rather than dense woods and tree-bordered fields.' 

 It seems to have a liking for hemlocks and pine trees, especially 

 If near a stream that attracts insects to its shores ; and Dr. War- 

 ren notes that in Pennsylvania he finds small flocks of these war- 

 blers in the autumn migration, feeding in the willow trees near 

 little rivers and ponds. Only in the northern parts of the United 

 States is their nest ever found, for the northern British provinces 

 are their preferred nesting ground. One seen in the White 

 Mountains was built on a mossy, rocky ledge, directly on the 

 ground at the foot of a pine tree, and made of rootlets, moss, 

 needles from the trees overhead, and several layers of leaves out- 

 side, with a lining of fine grasses that cradled four white, speckled 

 eggs. 



Audubon likened the bird's feeble note to the breaking of 

 twigs. 



199 



