THE WARBLERS 69 



egg, although they may seal up their own speckled treas- 

 ures with it. Suppose the wicked cowbird comes back and 

 lays still another egg in the two-storied nest; what then? 

 The little Spartan yellow bird has been known to weave 

 still another layer of covering rather than hatch out an un- 

 welcome, greedy interloper to crowd and starve her own 

 precious babies. Two and even three-storied nests have 

 been f ourui. 



Black and White Creeping Warbler 



Length — 5 to 5.5 inches. About an inch smaller than the 

 English sparrow. 



Male — Upper parts white, varied with black. A white 

 stripe along summit of head and back of neck, edged 

 with black. White line above and below eye. Black 

 cheeks and throat, grayish in females and young. Breast 

 white in middle, with black stripes on sides. Wings and 

 tail rusty black, with two white cross-bars on former, 

 and soiled white markings on tail quills. 



Female — ^Paler and less distinct markings throughout. 



Range — ^Eastern United States and westward to the Plains. 

 North as far as the fur countries. Winters in tropics 

 south of Florida. 



Migrations — ^April. Late September. Summer resident. 



Nine times out of ten this active warbler is mis- 

 taken for the little downy woodpecker, not because of his 

 coloring alone, but also on account of their common habit 

 of running up and down the trunks of trees and on the 

 under side of branches, looking for insects, on which all the 

 warblers subsist. But presently the true warbler char- 



