94 THE TOWHEE. 



General Range. — Eastern United States and southern Canada, west to the 

 Plains, breeding from the lower Mississippi Valley and Georgia northward ; in 

 winter from the middle districts southward. 



Range in Ohio. — Common and universally distributed. Winters sparingly 

 in central, and (at least the males) commonly in southern Ohio. 



THE impulse to name birds according to what their songs and calls 

 seem to indicate in human language surely had a large part in the final adop- 

 tion of Towhee for this bird's name. Tozvhee for the song that he gives to 

 all the world from the topmost twig of some tree growing amid his tangled 

 retreat, Chezvink for the call of warning when his rights are threatened, and 

 Wink-zvink when he is nearly frantic at the danger to his family of eggs or 

 young. The song is seldom simply double syllabled, but the two prominent 

 notes are all that many persons seem to hear. The loud song may be Tozv- 

 hee-e-e, 0, toziu-hee-c-e-c, or even Chip, ah, tozv-hee-e-e. Its beginning is 

 subject to many changes, but its close is almost invariably a trill of greater 

 or less length on "e," and always high pitched. I never could make the song 

 spell "Chuck, burr, pilla-zmll-a-vuill." But different ears hear the same song 

 differently. The alarm call may be shortened to "szvink," or "zvink." The 

 birds even shorten their vocal expression to "Chuck, chuck," when the nest is 

 in great danger. Before the arrival of the female from the south the male 

 sometimes gives a rarely beautiful performance as a sort of solilocjuy as he 

 sedately walks about among the leaves under a thick bush. It is totally 

 unlike his ordinary song, and baffles any attempt at a description. It is soft 

 and does not carry beyond twenty feet. The tree-top rendition is clearly 

 his altruistic song, while this other one is as truly his egotistic song. 



Towhee has been called Ground Robin, probably because his sides are 

 strongly washed with rufous and because he builds his nest on the ground. 

 In general habits he is wholly unlike the Robin. One must look in the brushy 

 woods, or brush tangles, not in the open woods for this bird. He is a nervous 

 fellow, emphasizing his disturbance at your intrusion with a nervous Huff, 

 fluff of the short wings, and a jerk and guick spreading of the long, rounded 

 tail, as if he hoped the flash of white at its end would startle the intruder away. 



Occasionally hardy males may be found all winter even as far north as 

 Oberlin, but the true migration begins late in March, and the most of the 

 birds have gone south by the first of November. Numbers spend the winter 

 in the southern half of the state. 



Nesting begins about the first of May, earlier south, and earlier in early 

 springs. While the nest is usually placed on the ground, often even in a 

 slight depression, it may sometimes be placed in a bush several feet from .the 

 ground. It is made largely of leaves, with some plant stems, bark and grass, 

 with a lining of rootlets. The birds do not search far for material, but are 



