44 CIRCULAR 363, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
flights. It is used almost entirely by land birds. After taking off 
from the coast of Florida the migrants find only two land masses on 
the way where they can pause for rest and food. Nevertheless, tens 
of thousands of birds of some 60 species cross the 150 miles from Florida 
to Cuba, where about half of them elect to remain for the winter. 
The others fly the 90 miles between Cuba and Jamaica. From that 
point to the South American coast, however, there is a stretch of un- 
broken ocean fully 500 miles across, and scarcely a third of the North 
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FIGURE 23.— Distribution and migration of the bobolink. In crossing to South America most of the bobo- 
links use route no. 3 (fig. 20), directly from Jamaica across an unbroken stretch of ocean. Colonies of these 
birds have established themselves in several areas in the western United States, but in migration they ad- 
here to the ancestral flyways and show no tendency to take the short cut across Arizona, New Mexico, 
and Texas. 
American migrants leave the forested mountains of Jamaica to risk 
the perils of this ocean trip. Chief among those that do is the bobo- 
link (Dolichonyx oryzivorus), which so far outnumbers all other birds 
using this flyway that route no.-3 may well be called ‘‘the bobolink 
route” (fig. 23). As traveling companions along this route the bobo- 
links may meet vireos, kingbirds, and nighthawks from Florida; 
the chuck-will’s-widow (Antrostomus carolinensis) of the Southeastern 
States; black-bulled and yellow-billed cuckoos (Coccyzus erythropthal- 
mus and C. americanus) from New England; gray-cheeked thrushes 
from Quebec, bank swallows (Riparia riparia) from Labrador; and 
