THRASHERS 329 



made up of bugs, miscellaneous insects, and spiders. One-third 

 of the vegetable food consists of cultivated fruits, or those 

 which may be cultivated, as strawberries, raspberries, and black- 

 berries; but while we debit the bird with the whole of this, 

 it is probable — and in the eastern and well-wooded part of the 

 country almost certain — that a larg:e part is obtained from wild 

 vines. The rest of Ijhe vegetable matter is mostly wild fruit, as 

 cherries, dogrwood, sour gum, elderberries, greenbrier, spice- 

 berries, black alder, sumac and poison ivy. Although the cat- 

 bird sometimes does considerable harm by destroying small 

 fruit, it can not on the whole be considered injurious. On 

 the contrary, in most parts of the country it does far more 

 good than harm.* 



Cultivated fruit may be protected from attacks of catbirds 

 aad other species by planting mulberries, of which the birds 

 are very fond, in the vicinity of the fruit to be protected. 

 The growing of wild cherry, buckthorn, dogwood, wild grape, 

 and elder is also advised as an aid in escaping the depreda- 

 tions of the birds. 



McAtee has listed the various kinds of fleshy fruits pre- 

 ferred by different birds and among those which the catbird 

 frequently takes are mentioned the following which might 

 profitably be planted on farms or along roadsides for the use 

 of the birds: Sumac, holly, black haw, honeysuckle, green 

 brier, June berry, and mountain ash.f 



BROWN THRASHER; "BROWN THRUSH": Toxostoma 

 rufa rufa (Linnaeus) . 



State records. — The brown thrasher is a common and gen- 

 erally distributed permanent resident. Although the winter 

 population is increased by the arrival of migrants from the 

 North, the bird seems to be hardly more numerous at that 

 season than in summer. It is less common in the Coast Belt 

 than elsewhere, both in summer and winter. Only 4 or 5 

 were seen at Orange Beach in January and 2 or 3 at Bayou 

 Labatre in February. Eggs have been found at Leighton 

 on numerous dates from April 13 to May 25 and on July 13 ; 

 Prattville, April 14 ; Barachias, April 28, and Ardell, June 25. 



•Seal, F. B. L., Farmers' .Bulletin 6S0, rev. ed., p. 10, 1918. 



tMcAtee, W. L., Community bird refuges: Farmers' Bull. 1289, pp. 7-8, 1921. 



