62 NOKTH AMERICAN WARBLERS. 



The myrtle bird is found in winter throughout the Bahamas, and is 

 a common winter resident of Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, and Porto Rico. 

 It also includes in its winter range eastern Texas and eastern Mexico, 

 where it is one of the commonest winter birds from the coast 

 to 3,000 feet and is less common 1,000 feet higher. It ranges west 

 rarely to Guanajuato" and reaches the Pacific Ocean at the Isthmus of 

 Tehuantepec. It is not uncommon in Yucatan ^ and is generally dis- 

 tributed in Guatemala up to an elevation of 5,000-6,000 feet. Farther 

 east it is not common, though it has been taken at Belize, British 

 Honduras, San Pedro, Honduras, end on the islands off the coasts of 

 Yucatan ^ and Honduras. ^^ The species has been found in eastern 

 Nicaragua ^ from November 28 to February 16, has been taken in Costa 

 Rica in the Angostura Mountains and twice at San Jose,-^ and has been 

 recorded twice in Panama — at Lion Hill near the north coast and at 

 Chiriqui in the mountains on the Pacific slope. It has not yet been 

 reported from the mainland of South America. The foregoing records 

 shew that the winter distribution of the species in Mexico and Central 

 America is not such as would be anticipated of a bird so strictly boreal 

 in its breeding habits. In general it occupies the coasts and the lower 

 plateaus, while the sides of the mountains, where it w^ould be expected 

 to occur, are occupied by its western relative, the Audubon warbler. 



Spring migration. — The myrtle warbler is one of the first migrants 

 to move northward. A large flight struck the Alligator Reef light- 

 house February 23, 1892, and some 60 birds struck the Sombrero Key 

 lighthouse March 3, 1889. By the middle of March migration is well 

 under way over all the winter range, and the foremost birds keep 

 close behind the disappearance of frost. A strange state of affairs 

 appears in connection with the migration of the m^^rtle warbler in the 

 district just north of the ordinary winter range. The bird is well 

 known, and the records are so numerous that the usual dates of arrival 

 can be ascertained with much accuracy. Four towns in Pennsjdvania, 

 varying in altitude from Pliiladelphia at sea level to Renovo at about 

 1,000 feet, report average dates of arrival ranging from April 27 to 

 April 30. Directly north in the western half of New York the aver- 

 age date of arrival varies from May 1 to May 3, and the same dates 

 will cover the usual time when the first birds appear in northwestern 

 Ohio. In southeastern New York the average date of arrival is April 

 25; at Boston, April 22; in southern New Hampshire and southern 

 Maine, April 23; at St. John, New Brunswick (average of eleven 

 years of observation), April 23, and in the Province of New Bruns- 



«Duges, La Nat, I, p. 140, 1870. 



& Stone, Proc. Acad. Nat, Sci. Phil., p. 210, 1890; Boucard, P. Z. S., p. 440, 1883, 



<^ Salvin, Ibis, p. 248, 188'8. 



(ZRidgway, Proc. T. S. Nat. Mus., X, p. 575, 1888. 



e Richmond, Proc. TJ. S. Nat. Mus., XVI, p. 484, 1893. 



/Cherrie, Auk, VIII, p. 278, 1891. 



