246 
BIRDS OF PENNSYLVANIA. 
hoppers, crickets, ants, flies and numerous larval forms. Fruits of the 
cedar and mulberry trees, also strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, 
wild g-rapes and other small fruits may be included among their favorite 
articles of diet. This bird, with its large and powerful bill, operated by 
strong muscles of its head, can readily break into fragments the hard 
grains of maize, as well as the large seeds of different kinds on which it 
subsists. Its known ability in this particular has earned for it, in some 
places, the local name of Hed Corncracker. 
Genus HABIA Reichenbach. 
Habia ludoviciana (Linn.). 
Rose-breasted Grosbeak ; Porato-bug^ bird. 
Description (Plate 85, adults and young'). 
Length about 8*inches ; extent about 13 inches. Young males in late summer and 
fall have rose and red markings on breast, and under wing-coverts more or less 
distinct. The female has lining of wings and axillaries saflVon yellow. 
Habitat . — Eastern United States and southern Canada, west to the eastern border 
of the plains; in winter, to Cuba, Central America and northern South America. 
In eastern Pennsylvania the Rose-breasted Grosbeak is found as a 
regular, though usually not a common, visitant during migrations in May 
and September, when this species is mostly seen in small parties of 
from five to a dozen each. In the spring, while passing northward (they 
breed for the most part north of Pennsylvania), the males arrive nearly 
a week in advance of the females, but in the fall both sexes, according 
to my observation, migrate together. Mr. Benj. M. Everhart, of West 
Chester, says that twenty-five years ago this species was a rather com- 
mon summer resident in Chester and Delaware counties, where he has 
repeatedly found their nests, eggs and young. In both of these districts 
the Rose-breasts are now rarely found in the summer time. Although 
these bright-colored* and sweet-voiced songsters have apparently 
abandoned most of their summering resorts, in our eastern districts, 
many of their number find a congenial summer abode in the western 
and northwestern parts of our state, particularly in Crawford and Erie 
counties, where, my highly esteemed friend, Mr. Geo. B. Sennett, assures 
me, these birds are regular and rather plentiful summer residents, nest- 
ing in low trees and bushes. The nest is a thin, flattened structure, made 
up of rootlets, small twigs and dried grasses; the dull greenish-white 
eggs, spotted with brown, are three or four in number and measured about 
one inch by three-fourths of an inch. These birds, while sojourning here, 
frequent chiefly groves and forests ; apple orchards and gardens are also 
sometimes visited by them. It is said that in some sections of Crawford 
* Two or three years are, it is said, required before the males acquire their full beauty, and it is also 
stated that the adult males in the late summer and fall lose much of their black and become more or less 
streaked with brownish tints. 
