fH^ NIDIOlvOGlS^. 



63 



the male, as is the 

 case with many of 

 our Warblers, has 

 little or nothing to 

 do, but sits in a 

 neighboring tree 

 and sings while his 

 partner does the 

 hard work. The 

 song, or buzz as it 

 might more prop- 

 erly be called, is so 

 peculiar that, 

 though faint, it at 

 once forces itself 

 upon the attention A 



as something out of the common. It con- 

 sists of about six distinct notes, beginning 

 low on the scale and ascending rapidly for 

 five notes when it suddenly drops the sixth 

 down to about the pitch of number one. 

 I can think of no better expression for the 

 note, which resembles more closely the 

 buzz of a bee than the song of a bird, than 

 zee. 



The location of the nest is usually on the 

 border of some pond or river, though fre- 

 quently in some orchard or overgrown 

 pasture. In Massachusetts it is, with rare 

 exceptions',* built in the long hanging 

 moss, usnea, which, in some places, hangs 

 from the branches of every tree and bu.sh 

 in quite a large area, and for the reason 

 that these large patches of moss a: e scarce, 

 the birds colonize to a larger extent than 

 any of our other Warblers. It must not be 

 inferred from the above that every patch of 

 usnea contains a Parula for, although the 

 rule " Every Parula has its bed of usnea" 

 generally holds good, the reverse is by no 

 means true. The birds select a thick, 

 hanging clump of moss, make a hole near 

 the top, and, after burrowing into it for a 

 few inches, interlace the moss at the bottom 

 of the hole so as to form a neat little struct- 

 that holds a decided resemblance to the 

 nests of both the Baltimore Oriole and the 

 Marsh Wrens. It is then thoroughly bed- 



GROUP OF SEAL LIONS 



ded with more moss intermingled with a 

 few horse-hairs, pine-needles, cotton, etc., 

 in some cases very little lining but the moss 

 is used, while others are thicklyglined with 

 all the above mentioned materials. The 

 internal depth is usually about one and a 

 half inches, diameter two to two and a half 

 inches. The entrance, or entrances, varies 

 in size being seldom more than an inch in 

 diameter. The height of the nest from the 

 ground also varies greatly, particularly 

 with different writers, some having found 

 them as high as sixty feet and as low as six 

 inches while twenty feet is considered the 

 average. My experience has been very 

 different, for of ten nests, examined one 

 morning, not one was over twelve feet from 

 the ground. The highest I ever saw was 

 twenty feet, the lowest two feet up, the 

 average being between eight and ten feet. 

 In selecting a location they are not at all 

 particular, as one nest was found in a small 

 bush that stood in the water twenty feet 

 out from the shore of a pond, but the 

 majority are found on or near the margin, 

 or, if the place is swampy, several yards 

 inland in either a bush or a tree, evergreen 

 or otherwise. 



The number of eggs to a set is, as a rule, 

 from three to five, four being most com- 

 monly found, though sets of seven or more 

 have been recorded which must be consid- 



