( 464 ) 



GREEN BLACK-CAPT WARBLER. 



Sylvia MiTRATA, Lath. 



PLATE ex. Vol. II. p. 66. 



Dr Townsend informs me, that this species is " found at Colum- 

 bia River, where it breeds. The nest is somewhat pensile, and is 

 usually fastened to a horizontal twig, from 6 to 10 feet from the ground, 

 to which it is firmly attached by a long hair-like moss. Of this moss 

 and of bent the fabric is entirely composed, no hair, down, or cottony 

 substance being ever used. The eggs are four, white, spotted all over 

 with light brown, the markings most numerous at the large end." 



Mr Nuttall's notice respecting it is as follows. " About the first 

 week of May the species arrives in the woods of the Columbia, where 

 it takes up its summer residence. It has a warble somewhat like that 

 of the S. cestiva, but more brief : ''tsh ''tsh 'tsh ''tshea, or something simi- 

 lar. It was generally familiar and unsuspicious, kept in bushes more 

 than trees, in the thickets bordering the river, most commonly busily 

 engaged collecting its insect fare, and only varying its employment 

 by an occasional musical call. By the 12th of May, they were already 

 feeding their full-fledged young, though I also found a nest on the 16th 

 of the same month, containing four eggs, and just commencing incubar 

 tion. The nest was in the branch of a small service bush, laid very 

 adroitly upon an accidental mass of old moss that had fallen from a tree 

 above. It was made of moss {Hypnum), and with a thick lining of dry, 

 wiry, slender grass. The female, when I approached, went ofi^ slyly, 

 running along the ground like a mouse. The eggs are very similar to 

 those of the Summer Yellow-bird, covered with spots of a pale olive- 

 brown." 



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