BIRDS OF NOETH AND MIDDLE AMEEIOA. 489 



TELMATODYTES PALUSTRIS PALUSTRIS (Wilson). 

 LONG-BILLED MARSH WREN. 



Adults in spnng and early smnmer."' — Pileum dull black, more or 

 less brownish medially, usually with a broad and distinct though 

 never sharply defined median area of olive-brown or broccoli brown 

 on forehead and crown, occasionally continued to the hindneck, 

 dividing the blackish into two widely separated lateral broad stripes; 

 hindneck mostly plain brown; back (interscapular area) black, 

 streaked with white; scapulars, rump, and upper tail-coverts plain 

 brown (varying from nearly broccoli brown to between raw umber 

 and mars brown), the last sometimes faintly barred with darker; 

 middle pair of rectrices brown, more or less distinctly barred with 

 dusky, the remaining rectrices paler brown broadly and regularly 

 barred with dull black, the inner webs blackish serrated along edges 

 and barred entirely across near tip with pale brown; lesser and middle 

 wing-coverts plain brown, the latter sometimes with a small terminal 

 spot of pale brown or dull brownish white; greater coverts brown, 

 more or less distinctly barred with dusky (the bars sometimes obsolete) ; 

 outer webs of tertials mostly black, but this more or less deeply indented 

 or serrated exteriorly with light brown; remiges otherwise dusky, the 

 secondaries edged, or serrated along edge, with pale brown, the pri- 

 maries similarly marked with still paler and more grayish brown or 

 pale brownish gray; a narrow superciliary stripe of white, narrowly 

 streaked with blackish, extending to sides of occiput; a brown or 

 dusky postocular streak, varying in width and distinctness; loral and 

 suborbital regions dull grayish white or brownish white, the auricular 

 region (except upper margin) similar but more strongly tinged with 

 brownish; malar region and under parts dull white, passing on sides 

 and flanks into pale broccoli brown, wood brown, or Isabella color, the 

 chest usually faintly (rarely strongly) tinged with the same, the sides 

 and flanks sometimes more or less speckled or indistinctly barred with 

 darker brown or dusky; under tail-coverts brownish white or very 

 pale brown, usually narrowly barred with brownish or dusky, some- 

 times immaculate; maxilla blackish brown or dusky with paler tomia; 

 mandible pale basally, more or less extensively dusky terminally; iris 

 brown; legs and feet brownish (in dried skins). 



Adults in autumn and winter. — Similiar to the spring and early 

 summer plumage, but colors deeper and richer, the brown of rump 

 etc. , more chestnut, that of sides and flanks deeper. 



Young. — Essentially like adults, but pattern of coloration less dis- 



aJn late summer the general coloration is, through fading and abrasion of the 

 plumage, much duller, with the brown more grayish. In this condition the several 

 subspecies are much alike, their distinctive coloration having, to a greater or less 

 degree, become obliterated. 



