SOME DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WESTERN AND EAST- 
ERN BIRDS. 
BY T. MARTIN TRIPPE. 
Wuen the primitive prairie becomes reclaimed from a state of 
nature by the pioneer and farmer, the fauna and flora undergo a 
very marked change. Many plants and animals disappear, and 
new ones take their places. The buffalo, elk and antelope retire 
before the advancing line of civilization, and are seldom found 
within the settlement; the deer, wolf and turkey gradually disap- 
pear as the country becomes populated, and are finally exterminated. 
Many species of Composite and other plants, found in great profu- 
sion on the unbroken prairie, become scarcer and scarcer, as the 
sod is broken up and cultivated, and at last disappear altogether. 
With the birds, the changes are rapid and numerous; some spe- 
cies are quickly exterminated, and others previously unknown, be- 
come abundant. So rapid is the progress of settlement in some 
portions of the west, that these changes become very marked from 
their suddenness. Local lists of the avi-fauna of eastern Iowa 
and Minnesota, taken twelve or fifteen years ago, would differ 
very materially from those of the same localities to-day ; and these 
lists would differ both in the species, and in their comparative and 
actual abundance. Even the habits of the birds undergo consid- 
erable modification, as it will appear in the following pages. 
Every one in the Eastern States is familiar with the song spar- 
row, that little brown minstrel that comes even before the blue-bird 
to tell us that spring is at hand. He is our earliest bird; a sort 
of ambassador from the feathered court, sent on by those princes 
royal of song, the thrushes and grosbeaks, to herald their approach. 
On some bright sunny day in February, when the chill of the air 
is somewhat softened by the returning sun, and the woods are vo- 
cal with the cry of the downy woodpecker, you hear him first, —a _ 
brisk, ringing strain, full of joy and hope, that speaks of warm 
days to come, and whispers promises of violets and anemones. 
If you wish for a nearer acquaintance, he is not a bit afraid, but 
sings as unconcernedly, although you may be watching him a few 
yards off, as though you were a mile away. In fact, he is semi 
(632) 
¢ 
