Junco 123 
leaves and earth rubbish after his vigorous 
manner. 
From Virginia southward, the people know 
the fox sparrow only as a winter resident. Be- 
fore he leaves them in the spring, he begins to 
practise the clear, rich, ringing song, which 
fairly startles one with pleasure the first time 
it is heard. 
JUNCO 
Called also: Slate-coloured Snow-bird 
When the skies are leaden and the first 
flurries of snow warn us that winter is near, 
flocks of juncos, that reflect the leaden skies on 
their backs, and the grayish-white snow on their 
breasts, come from the North to spend the 
winter, A few enter New England as early as 
September, but by Thanksgiving increased 
numbers are foraging for their dinner among 
the roadside thickets, in the furrows of 
ploughed fields, on the ground near evergreens, 
about the barn-yard and even at the dog’s plate 
beyond the kitchen door. 
Notice how abruptly the slate gray colour of 
the junco’s mantle ends in a straight line across 
his light breast, and how, when he flies away, 
the white feathers on either side of his tail serve 
as signals to his friends to follow. Such signals 
