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A BI-MONTHLY MAGAZINE 



DEVOTED TO THE STUDY AND PROTECTION OF BIRDS 



Official Organ of The Audubon Societies 



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?^s/ Musftu^: 



Vol. XXI 



March— April, 1919 



No. 2 



The Warblers of Central New York 



By A. A. ALLEN, Ph D., Assistant Professor of Ornithology Cornell University 



With Photographs by the Author 



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^HE fascination of the Warblers is 

 irresistible. Their arrival in the 

 spring awakens even the most 

 callous ornithologist and pulls him out 

 of bed before his accustomed time. Their 

 bright colors, their great variety, their 

 active habits, almost madden the begin- 

 ner, as, in a frenzy, he follows their 

 darting forms through the tree-tops or 

 strains his neck in an effort to locate 

 some lisping song. Years go by before 

 the maze of plumages is straightened out 

 and the songs finally remembered from 

 spring to spring. 



But he who follows the little fellows 

 after they leave the gardens and shade 

 trees and hide themselves in thicket, 

 forest, and swamp, has a still greater 

 enchantment before him. Decades may 

 pass before he has traced them all to 

 their abodes, learned all their breeding 

 songs, and discovered the nest of every 

 species. For bird-nesting is a time- 

 consuming business. Days may be spent 

 in a fruitless search of the undergrowth 

 before . the Mourning Warbler gives up 

 its secret, and one's neck may feel 

 broken a hundred times from scanning the tree-tops before one finds the 

 nest of the Blackburnian or the Cerulean. But what a joy it is at last to 



ON GUARD 

 The male Mourning Warbler has fed the young 

 and is now waiting until he hears his mate 

 coming before leaving. 



