| Show t Out of Doors in the West Sketches of Natural History in the Rocky Mountain Plateau Edited by J. H. Professor of Nature Study in the University of Utah i MIGRATION AND PLUMAGE t OF THE WOOD WARBLERS From a Lecture by Claude T. Barnes forget-me-nots smile ling eye and heart mong the reeds and e the brook its music it the blushes 0 murmuring Sarah F. The is a large Peered orchid of the United e J the or flower by the base of the s grass-p fW remaining species of we that are found within 4 f first he Water Thrush- M ls w a solitary warbler that i wades in forest titting its tail like a and sometimes bursting into a musical It is to inches upper parts sooty olive dingy a dark brown stripe through the eye under parts sometimes barely tinged with throat finely and breast and sides broadly streaked with The breeding of this charming warbler in high meadows the from the Great Basin to the Pacific and The nests are placed in willow thickets and blackberry with two to four creamy spotted with reddish and A frequenter of low trustful and interesting in man- this warbler's brilliant yellow plumage and jaunty black cap impart life and brightness to western stops to run up a leans down to peck under a flutters under a spray like a humming and then flies singing his happy Wilson's Wilson's warbler is similar to the but not so and with shorter wings and Like the Wilson's is one of the most gorgeous tenants of the higher mountain It wears a dainty little cap that is jet bordered in front and below with golden while the upper parts are rich olive and the lower parts bright These warblers are quite abundant in some places and are dently partial to the thickets covering the boggy portions of the Calaveras The Calaveras warbler is from to inches in 1 bright yellow gray and with a partly concealed chestnut patch on the back olive brightening to yellowish green near the Its song is similar to that of the yellow It comes here from the Pacific coast in Warbling This is one of the few to be found in our It a small from 5 to 5 inches olive gray with a white streak through the wings and tail dusky sides of head pale brown under parts shaded on the sides with olive Its containing four or five reddish spotted is hung rather high from the fork of a in copses along the banks of This bird is rarely its colors like most of the other so In it is so and its habits so being chiefly a mountain that it is likely to be It has a warbling often heard in the wooded and the bird occasionally comes into the villages to gather insects from the leaves of garden trees and These birds are frequently confused with members of the fly catcher They come from the south about the first of along with the black headed grosbeak and bullock and are almost continuous singers till After the they but less renew their The song resembles that of the but is less ringing and A series of from eight to twelve not uttered in groups of several but coming from the branches of notifies us of the presence of the Migration of Scarcely a warbler in the United States remains through the winter in the vicinity of its nesting while most of them travel many hundreds or even thousands of to their winter There are few among our Utah The eastern pine warbler has one of the shortest of migration for it does not pass farther south in winter than the southern limit of its breeding migration this is simply the withdrawing of the northern breeding individuals and the massing of the whole species in the southern fourth of its summer This same pine warbler is also one of the few species that are confined in the winter season almost entirely to the United The on the other travels miles from Brazil to Alaska Nearly all of our Utah warblers spend the winter in Mexico and the contiguous portions of Central Are Night The warblers are night migrants the trip between Florida and Cuba chief is apparently always made at and at such a speed that in spring migration many birds Cuba after arriving on the Florida coast before The longer flight of from to miles across the Gulf of Mexico is also evidently made in a single night without stop or How long it takes for the usual journey over land is But either this flight is or else after a single night's journey the bird stops for several days to for the general advance of a species northward is only a few miles per Late like the Canadian average thirty miles a Manner of Land Warblers also perform long migrations by In when they are feeding during they are continually on the move in the general direction of their A person on foot can easily keep up with the shifting but in the aggregate quite a distance is The migration is a succession of Yesterday the woods were today almost every tree is alive flitting bright-hued and in a few hours have Warblers have the peculiar habit during migration of collecting in mixed flocks composed of many different as high as twenty-three different species having been seen passing through a small wood at one The as a are among the late spring Feeding on they remain in their southern homes until spring is well when their insect food has become abundant in the How They Find Their How the warblers find their way in the long night journeys is still a disputed Some believe they are guided and that mountain ranges and river courses form prominent land marks to aid in finding the Some think they are guided by a of others say it is Others claim that the young birds are led southward by the older ones and learn the way from All agree that each warbler endeavors to find the of the previous Why Birds The opinions concerning the causes of bird migration are just as One theory is that birds originally became so numerous that they ventured northward for that the north is their and they were driven south by the ice of the glacial These theories confronted by queer The myrtle warbler presses north in when the trees are still bare of while the Canadian warbler forms one of the rear after vegetation has reached nearly full summer Instead of waiting until the winter's cold and a shortage of food compel them to the more southern breed ing individuals the I warbler begin their fall i in early when and their a supply has not yet f The American Bird B j society distributes small tt jv i bands to bird 1 place and is jJ upon the leg of a nestlin anyone find one of these 2 he is requested to A New r is conducted jj 1 the supervision of the Ornithologists' Mortality Among The death rate amon American Warblers is higher than that which in any other family of Their nest probably above the ij a variety of encountered during extended often cause to perish of J Their Chief Chief among the enemies oil warblers while in the nesti Cowbird's eggs been recorded from the no less than twenty-four of North American J list includes here the nog ern yellow long chat and the American The warblers may build concealed nests upon they may place the densest or in at a height of over eighty it is all one to the mk never having a home f forms no attachment for any PJ i It te not un j find three or even four eggs in one warbler's the-yellow warbler builds st in its nest to exclude the Cold and j During the nesting j biers sometimes suffer longed wet and cold and seT but it is while f that they are most exposed j Journeying by and crossing large they sometimes enco storms and die in countless j On Lake Ann I heard of ili pillion being strewn the Win the Gulf of Mexico millions n I I As a storm approaches they lery close to the They wt ali right as long as they are trough of the but as the II Jon as they reach the crest they 1 ge blown hundreds of yards back k else drowned They follow alongside of vessels in to keep from the but as they pass the they blown far across the water Br numbers of migrating annually meet their nth hy striking lighthouses or Serious accidents nature occur only during gy when the their descend V m the height at which they m been Apparently by the far-reaching c ifs of they fly towards illuminate of the tower are One Sep-er at the foot of Fire d Long i were found dead more than of the twenty-five species there being poll Plumage of len a warbler leaves the egg apparently but close will reveal on the er tracts of the upper sur-of I the body a scanty growth e finest This is the While the bird is in iest this downy plumage eded by a i has been termed both the md the juvenal but in my among birds may best be known s nestling low Plumage in the newly hatched here was it is forced by the rapidly growing of the nestling tips of which it remains for Where there was the nestling plum-y the first plumage to twelve to fourteen davs ELthe yoUng bird leaves the te plumage of its s virtually complete but is and the they support the bird in certain are not The Two The first fall feathers are acquired by molt of the feathers of the nestling plumage and the development of a new Both wings and tail belong properly to this first fall Although there may be some feather growth during the the first fall plumage remains virtually unchanged until the following by a molt involving the feathers of various parts of the but not those of the wings and the first breeding plumage is The breeding plumage usually resembles that of the mature bird except in intensity of Following the nesting in accordance with the almost universal law of an entirely new set of including wing and tail is and like the plumage of the first is unchanged until the succeeding when certain feathers of the body may be Nestling and Adult It if not to frame a law which shall express the relations of the nestling plumage of warblers to their adult When the adult is olive green yellow or whitish and without spots or the young is dull olive green or olive brown dusky or grayish with the belly whitish or yellowish When the plumage of the adult is varied in with streaks or the plumage of the nestling is likewise generally streaked or spotted When the adult is gray the nestling is When the adult is brown the nestling is There is a great similarity in the nestling plumage where the adults resemble each An interesting character shown by the with but few is the presence of wing bars when they are absent or obscure in the With the molt from nestling into first fall these buff colored bars are When in the adults there exists a sexual difference in the color of the wings or the nestling presents a corresponding difference in since both wings and tail are retained until after the first nesting no such difference the nestlings of both sexes are alike in Laws of Fall There are two laws we might lay down concerning the fall plumage of the When the sexes are alike or nearly alike in the- fall plumage of both is generally like the spring plumage When the male in spring plumage differs from the he generally resembles her in fall plumage the spring is in the air And in the sweet sunbeams come and go Upon the in lanes the wild flowers And tender leaves' are bursting About the hedge the warblers peer and Each bush is full of amorous flut- And rapturous Printing is usually done by but we have seen a There's virtue in but evil as As those who've examined cau easily Learning is but there's something not right When a rope must be taut before it gets |
