Conspicuously Yellow and Orange 
repeated over and over again with a persistency worthy of a 
Kentucky warbler. It is delivered from a perch within a few feet 
of the ground, as high as the bird seems ever inclined to ascend. 
Nashville Warbler 
( Helmintbophila ruficapilla) Wood Warbler family 
Length — 4.75 to 5 inches. About an inch and a half smaller than 
the English sparrow. 
Male — Olive-green above; yellow underneath. Slate-gray head 
and neck. Partially concealed chestnut patch on crown. 
Wings and tail olive-brown and without markings. 
Female — Dull olive and paler, with brownish wash underneath. 
Range — North America, westward to the plains; north to the Fur 
Countries, and south to Central America and Mexico. Nests 
north of Illinois and northern New England ; winters in 
tropics. 
Migrations— April. September or October. 
It must not be thought that this beautiful warbler confines 
itself to backyards in the city of Nashville simply because Wil- 
son discovered it near there and gave it a local name, for the 
bird’s actual range reaches from the fur trader’s camp near Hud- 
son Bay to the adobe villages of Mexico and Central America, 
and over two thousand miles east and west in the United States. 
It chooses open rather than dense woods and tree-bordered fields. 
It seems to have a liking for hemlocks and pine trees, especially 
if near a stream that attracts insects to its shores ; and Dr. War- 
ren notes that in Pennsylvania he finds small flocks of these war- 
blers in the autumn migration, feeding in the willow trees near 
little rivers and ponds. Only in the northern parts of the United 
States is their nest ever found, for the northern British provinces 
are their preferred nesting ground. One seen in the White 
Mountains was built on a mossy, rocky ledge, directly on the 
ground at the foot of a pine tree, and made of rootlets, moss, 
needles from the trees overhead, and several layers of leaves out- 
side, with a lining of fine grasses that cradled four white, speckled 
eggs. 
Audubon likened the bird’s feeble note to the breaking of 
twigs. 
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