HOODED WARBLER. 265 
dense snow-berry bushes in the woods, and Mr. Otto Widmann says that it is a rather 
common bird in certain localities near St. Louis. Mr. Ridgway observed it frequently 
in southern Illinois and Indiana. “In all rich damp woods,” he says, ‘‘both in Illinois 
and Indiana, I have found the beautiful Hooded Warbler a more or less common species. 
In the woods of Knox and Gibson Counties, Indiana, immediately opposite Mount 
Carmel, it is particularly abundant, so much so, in fact, as to be one of the most 
characteristic species.” In this region the woods consist chiefly of ash trees, red maple, 
cotton-wood, elms, swamp, white and water oaks, sweet gums, and on higher land of 
hickories, oaks, tulip trees', catalpas?, elms, beech, and other trees in great variety, 
coniferous species being wholly absent. The bird is “only noticed in those localities, 
where the switch cane* forms more or less of the undergrowth, over which trails the 
rough, bright green stems of a species of Galium, and, but less frequently, a low-growing 
or trailing smilax (probably S.. Walteri). The nest is built with scarcely any attempt 
at concealment, in a low bush, from one to two feet from the ground.” (Ridgway.) 
In Wisconsin and northern Illinois I have never seen the bird, but Mr. C. E. Akeley 
collected a fine male at Elm Grove, near Milwaukee, on May 16, 1890. 
The Hooded Warbler is distributed over the Eastern States west to the Plains. It 
is, however, more an inhabitant of the central and southern regions of the country, arriv- 
ing in Georgia and South Carolina in the latter part of April. About April 30 to May 3 
the first males arrive from their winter home in the West Indies, eastern Mexico, and 
Central America in south-western Missouri and other localities under the same latitude. 
May 9 they are usually at St. Louis the noisiest birds of the woods. They never make 
their appearance where spring has not fairly entered. Trees and shrubs must be in full 
leaf and bloom ere they deign to arrive. This Warbler rivets the attention of the observer 
by its peculiarly restless flitting through thickets, its dazzling hues, and its strange ventrilo- 
quialsong. Few other birds, excepting the Chat, the Cardinal Redbird, and the White-eyed 
Vireo, make as much ado in their abodes. Where the above described woodland thickets 
are found, be it near a pond, river, rushing brook, or clear spring, this bird need not 
long be sought, though it is no easy task to discover it among the evergreen kalmias, 
the dense azaleas, or swamp honey-suckles, the jungles of rhododendrons, or among the 
thorny bushes entangled with vines, where swarms of mosquitoes buss about the ears 
of the observer. This bird is a very alert insect catcher, securing the main part of its 
food in the air. Its haunts abound in mosquitoes, gnats, bugs, and other insects. Here 
it leads atruly gay life, flitting after insects, often making the sharpest turns and most 
wonderful zigzag lines. Then it flies over, through, and around the bushes, over the 
ground, even turning summersaults in the air, sometimes singing and occasionally 
uttering its peculiar call-note, a sharp tship. It-is not really a shy bird, but, owing to 
the rapidity of its motions, it is dificult to observe, except during short intervals. The 
chance of hearing its cheerful strain occurs much oftener than the opportunity of seeing it. 
In its manners, especially in the way of obtaining its food, it resembles much the Fly- 
catchers, but in form and in its song it is a genuine Warbler. Passing flowers and leaves, 
it often snatches insects from them. This‘I frequently noticed in the South, when the 
magnificent magnolias were in full bloom, perfuming the air with their delightful 
1 Liriodendron tulipifera. 2 Catalpa speciosa. 3 Arundunaria tecta. 
34. 
