308 BIRDS OF ALABAMA 



common at Greensboro between April 6 and May 6 and his 

 collection contains numerous specimens taken between April 

 12 and 30. Saunders records it fairly common at Woodbine, 

 April 3-27. At Barachias, April 21-25 (1912), and at Muscle 

 Shoals, April 22-25 (1914), I found it numerous and singing. 



General habits. — This warbler differs from most of the 

 other members of the gerius in being largely terrestrial in 

 habits. In the South it frequents cultivated fields, gardens, 

 pastures, marshes, and open, brushy timber tracts, and is 

 often found in loose flocks numbering sometimes 40 or 50 

 birds. It has a characteristic habit of drooping its tail as it 

 sits in a bush or on a weed stalk or a fence, and its sharp 

 chipping note, though not loud, serves to call attention to the 

 bird's presence. 



Food habits. — Examination of 15 stomachs of this species 

 from Alabama showed the food to consist of insects, with a 

 few spiders. The insect remains included weevils and other 

 beetles, ants and other Hymenoptera, small bugs, caterpillars, 

 grasshoppers, and ephemerids. W. D. Doan reports finding 

 red ants and house flies in stomachs of this species,* and R. W. 

 Williams, Jr., states that on October 16, 1904, near Talla- 

 hassee, Florida, he observed large numbers of the birds feed- 

 ing on cotton worms. 



YELLOW PALM WARBLER : Dendroica palnumim 

 hypochrysea Ridgway. 



State records. — The yellow palm warbler, characterized by 

 the greater amount of yellow on the underparts, is a common 

 winter resident in the southern parts of the Gulf States. 

 Writing of the migrations of the two races. Prof. Cooke says : 

 "In central Alabama, palmarum appears as a fall migrant and 

 passes on to the southeast, its place being taken by hypochry- 

 sea as a common winter resident. Early in the spring 

 hypochrysea leaves for the northeast and later palmarum 

 passes through toward the Mississippi Valley.f 



In the pine flats of the Coast Plain the yellow palm 

 (hypochrysea) is the prevailing form in winter. Specimens 



•West Virginia Exp. Sta., Bull 3, p. 82, 1888. 

 tCooke, W. W., Biol. Surv. Bull. 18, p. 96, 1904. 



