LAND BIRDS. 539 
(Tazewell Co., Ill.), and compared the food with that found in twelve 
specimens taken here and there in other places. In the latter lot cater- 
pillars formed about 20 percent of the food, while in the former 72 percent 
consisted of caterpillars, 50 percent being cankerworms, 5 percent other 
span-worms, 17 percent cutworms, together with 9 percent of beetles, 7 
percent of snails, and a few seeds of pigeon grass (Setaria). Of course 
being a typical seed-eater its staple food during a large part of the year 
consists of the seeds of weeds and grasses. : 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Adult male: Top of head, ear-coverts, and back and sides of neck clear gray or brownish- 
gray, the forehead and crown often glossed with greenish-yellow; a yellowish stripe over 
the eye, becoming whitish posteriorly, and another but shorter yellow stripe below the ear- 
coverts; back brownish-gray, sharply streaked with black; rump and upper tail-coverts 
similar, but without streaks; chin white; throat black, the color often extending down the 
middle of the breast; breast (and sometimes belly) yellow in the middle, its sides grayish, 
as are the sides of the body and the flanks; belly and under tail-coverts white; lesser and 
middle wing-coverts rufous or chestnut, and the inner scapulars often washed with the same 
color; wings and tail dusky, edged with brownish-gray; bill dusky above, lighter below, 
the sides of lower mandible horn-blue at base; iris brown. Adult female: Similar, but 
duller; usually lacking the black throat, or with simply a row of dark streaks on each side; 
the light streaks on side of head with little or no trace of yellow, and the yellow of the under 
parts fainter and less extensive. Young birds are similar to adult females, but are “every- 
where tinged with dull buffy or ochraceous” (Ridgway). 
Length 5.75 to 6.80 inches, wing 2.80 to 3.30, tail 2.35 to 2.90. 
Family 57. TANGARIDAL. Tanagers. 
Of the two species common to the eastern states but one, the Scarlet 
Tanager, has been found in Michigan thus far. The other, the Summer 
Tanager, Piranga rubra, is readily separable by its decidedly larger bill, 
the culmen measuring more than .75 inch, while that of the Scarlet Tanager 
measures less than .75 inch. (See Appendix.) 
244. Scarlet Tanager. Piranga erythromelas Vveill. (608) 
Synonyms: Common Tanager, Red-bird, Black-winged Red-bird, Summer Red-bird 
(as distinct from the Winter Red-bird or Cardinal), Fire-bird.—Piranga erythromelas, 
Vieillot, 1819.—Tanagra rubra, Linn., 1766, Wilson, Nuttall, Audubon.—Pyranga rubra 
of most authors until 1886.—Piranga erythromelas, A. O. U. Check-list, 1886, and most 
subsequent authors. 
Figure 122. 
The scarlet head and body, with black wings and tail, belong to no bird 
but the male Scarlet Tanager in spring and summer; in autumn the same 
bird has olive-green or greenish yellow in place of the red, but keeps the 
black wings and tail. The ae is always olive-green above and yellowish 
] the wings and tail grayish. ; 
fag Pe eae eee United States, west to the Plains, and north to 
southern Ontario and Manitoba. In winter the West Indies, eastern 
Mexico, Central America and northern South America. 
This probably is our most brilliant plumaged bird and a common summer 
resident throughout the state, but apparently most abundant in the Lower 
