PASSERINE BIRDS OF NEW YORK 297 



the feathers when the birds arrive in May. Although I have 

 no positive evidence of this moult, spring birds are in quite as 

 fresh plumage as those of autumn and I do not believe the 

 latter could be so little affected by wear during the winter 

 months as not to show more of it on their return. This plum- 

 age is the same as the last, perhaps whiter below and with less 

 obvious barring on the flanks and crissum and it becomes badly 

 frayed before the end of the breeding season. 



5. Adult Winter Plumage acquired by a complete post- 

 nuptial moult in August. Practically indistinguishable from first 

 winter but the wings and tail usually grayer, the tertiaries and 

 wing coverts more heavily barred. 



6. Adult Nuptial Plumage acquired by a complete pre- 

 nuptial moult the same as in the young bird. 



Females. — The sexes are alike, the female perhaps averaging 

 a little duller, and the moults are the same. 



CERTHIID^ 



There is only the annual moult in the one species found in 

 New York. Young birds appear to get a new tail at the post- 

 juvenal moult retaining the remiges until the first postnuptial. 



Certhia familiaris americana (Bonap.). Brown Creeper 



1. Natal Down. No specimen seen. 



2. Juvenal Plumage acquired by a complete postnatal moult. 



Above, including sides of head, streaked or mottled with bistre, sepia and wood- 

 brown, the rump russet, the feathers centrally pale brown on the crown, 

 whitish on the back. Wings clove-brown, reduced to a line on the outer web 

 of the tertiaries ; the coverts edged with pale buff, which also edges sub- 

 terminally the secondaries and tertiaries, these as well as the primaries being 

 crossed by a midway bar besides, and all are tipped with pale smoke-gray. 

 Tail pale wood-brown, dusky along the shafts and narrowly barred. Below, 

 dull white, flecked on the chin, throat and sides with pale sepia, the crissum 

 faintly cinnamon tinged. Lores and auriculars dusky ; indistinct superciliary 

 line grayish white. Bill and feet pinkish buff, dusky later. 



3. First Winter Plumage acquired by a partial postjuvenal 

 moult, beginning early in August in eastern Canada, which in- 



