20 BULLETIN 280, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
Caterpillars, eaten in every month and mostly in goodly quantities, 
appear to be a favorite food of the hermit thrush. December is the 
month of least consumption (2.75 per cent), while the most were 
eaten in June (17.08 per cent). The average for the year is 9.54 per 
cent. Hemiptera (bugs) seem to be eaten whenever found, as they 
appear in the food of every month, but rather irregularly and not 
in large quantities. The greatest consumption was in June (9.17 per 
cent), but July, September, and December show the least (less than 
1 per cent). The total for the year is 3.63 per cent. Of the six 
families represented, the Pentatomide, or stink bugs, predominate. 
These highly flavored insects are eaten by most insectivorous birds 
often, but usually in small quantities. 
Diptera (flies) comprise 3.02 per cent of the food of the hermit 
thrush. The record shows, however, that nearly all of them are 
either crane flies (Tipulide) and their eggs and larve, or March flies 
(Bibio) and their larve. Over 150 of the latter were found in one 
stomach. Both of these families of flies lay their eggs in the ground, 
which accounts for their consumption by ground-feeding birds. Or- 
thoptera (grasshoppers and crickets) are eaten by the hermit thrush 
to the extent of 6.32 per cent of its food. While this figure is not 
remarkable, it is the highest for any of the genus. These birds are 
fond of dark moist nooks among trees and bushes and do not feed 
extensively in those dry sunshiny places so much frequented by 
grasshoppers. A close inspection of the food record shows that the 
Orthoptera eaten by the thrushes are mostly crickets, which live in 
shadier and moister places than those where grasshoppers abound. 
A few miscellaneous insects (0.27 per cent) close the insect account. 
Spiders and myriapods (7.47 per cent) seem to constitute a very ac- 
ceptable article of diet, as they amount to a considerable percentage 
in nearly every month, and in May rise to 20.79 per cent. A few 
miscellaneous animals, as sowbugs, snails, and angleworms, make up 
the balance of the animal food (1.26 per cent). 
Following is a list of insects so far as identified and the number 
of stomachs in which found: 
HYMENOPTERA. Ti OpusternUsmuUnvals)= ee 
Hydrocharis obtusatus 
Spheridium lecontei 
Ptomaphagus consobrinits___ 
Anisotoma valida 
Megillatmaciiat¢ ee 
Anatis 15-maculata 
Psyllobora tedata _____ pa a 6 
Brachycantha wrsina_____-_ 
Endomychus biguttatus— 
Cryptophagus sp —___-. 
PATIOS) ie ee ister marginicollis___- 
Chlenius pennsylvanicus- 2 | Hister americanus —_ ~~ 
Stenolophus sp--2-—__=_—- Paes 1 Saprinus fimbriatus__- 
Anisodactylus agilis___ | Carpophilus hemipterus__ 
Tiphia inornata 
bo 
LOO TL TALS SY) see ee ses 
Nononiilus senustriatus.—_— = = 
Scarites subterraneus__-_-. 
Dyschirius pumilis 
Pterostichus patruelis 
Pterostichus sp____—- 
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