2 
The Scarlet Tanager 
exhaustive work on American birds, states that 2i genera and Ii2 
species are found in North and Middle America. Of these the Scarlet 
Tanager is the most conspicuous member of the family that is found in 
North America. It arrives at its summer home early in May and starts on 
its southward journey in the fall, late in September or early in October. As 
the Tanagers migrate by night, many of them become the victims of light- 
houses and thus give accurate records of migration dates, especially in the 
southward migration. It is of singular interest that the mortality occasioned 
by the light -stations is many times as great in the autumn as it is in the 
spring. What the reason for this difference is has not yet been discovered, 
although it may in some measure be accounted for from the fact that in the 
fall of the year there is more thick and misty weather than in the spring. 
From records made by the writer, female Tanagers were migrating north- 
ward past Fire- Island Lighthouse as late as May 15, and the same sex 
were migrating southward as early as September 23, while a young bird 
of the year had started south as early as September 18. The latest date in 
the fall furnished by a lighthouse victim was a male bird killed October ii. 
The Tanager’s breeding home is anywhere in eastern United States, as far 
south and west as Missouri, and in the southern British provinces from 
Nova Scotia to Manitoba. In the winter it retires to some parts of the 
West Indies, and to South America as far as Peru. 
Audubon says that the Tanager ”is very sensible to cold, so much so, 
NEST AND EGGS. SCARLET TANAGER 
Photographed by B. S. Bowdish 
