292 



REDSTART 



from limb to limb like a village belle with coquettishly held skirts trip- 

 ping the mazes of a country dance! 



The Redstart is at home in almost any kind of more or less open 

 deciduous woodland, but prefers lowland woods with a sapling under- 

 growth. The increase in trees in towns is fortunately tempting it to 

 widen its range, and in Cambridge, Mass., Brewster states it nests, 

 in places, "almost if not quite so numerously as in the Fresh Pond 

 swamps, or in the wilder parts of Arlington, Belmont, and Waverly." 



At times the Redstart descends to the ground to feed. Gerald 

 Thayer writes : "Like butterflies, of which they so much remind one, 

 — like many of the shy, high-flying butterflies,^^the usually tree-hunt- 

 ing Redstarts are wont at times to descend to earth to do strange sca- 

 venging work. Horse-manure, with its attendant insects, mightily 

 attracts them, and near Monadnock it is a common thing to see them 

 skipping about on the muck of travelled high-roads. I have known 

 a male to spend most of his time this way, in one spot, for several 

 days in succession." 



Annie Lyman Sears of Waltham, Mass., sends an interesting 

 study of a pair of Redstarts which on May 12, 1895, began to build 

 a nest on the bracket above a Venetian iron work lantern hanging 

 before the front door of her home. The female constructed the nest 

 alone and, unaided, performed the task of incubation. Miss Sears 

 writes: "It took (as nearly as I could tell) twelve days for the eggs 

 to hatch. After that the male was as busy as the female in supplying 

 the five hungry mouths with food. He never seemed at home on the 

 nest, and after feeding the young birds, would stand on a branch of 

 the lantern watching for his mate to return. When he saw her 

 approaching he would utter a little cry, fly down onto the piazza or steps 

 and sing. The female, on the contrary, after feeding the little ones, 

 settled down on the nest and stayed till the male brought more food. 

 They brought gnats, flies, green caterpillars, which they sometimes 

 appeared to break up in their own mouths before giving to the young 

 birds. Both birds became very tame, hopping about the chairs and steps 

 and nearly alighting on our persons. The male sang constantly. 

 The young left the nest on June 15, and as late, "as July 17, presumably 

 the same birds were seen in charge of the male who was still feeding 

 them." 



Song. — The song of the Redstart can be readily recognized by 

 those who know it but like so many Warblers' songs of what may be 

 called the weechy type, loses all character when it is reduced to sylla- 

 bles. 



