212 



USEFUL BIRDS. 



Scarlet Tanager. 

 Piranga erythromelas. 



Length. — About seven inches. 



Adult Male. — Entire body bright scarlet; wings and tail black; in autumn much 



like female, but retaining the black on wings and tail. 

 Adult Female. — Greenish above; yellowish below; wings and tail darker and 



brown-tinged. 

 Nest. — Of fine twigs and straws; usually in lower branches of some large tree, 



but sometimes fully twenty feet up ; occasionally in the orchard. 

 Eggs. — Light greenish-blue, with brown and purplish markings. 

 Season. — May to October. 



This most gorgeous of New England birds flashes through 

 the trees like a brand plucked from tropical flame ; but it 

 is a distinctly North American species, going south only in 



Fig. 77. — Scarlet Tanagers (male and female) and gipsy moth caterpillars. 



its fall migration, and returning to its chosen northern home 

 in the spring. The Tanager is a bird of large deciduous 

 woods, and is less common among great tracts of pines, 

 hemlocks, and other coniferous trees, although it is often 

 seen in small groves of these trees, and sometimes nests 

 there. The oaks are its first favorites, and wherever there 



