The home of my childhood and early youth nestles in one of the gems of
woodland which are so characteristic of the rolling prairies of central
Iowa. This hundred-acre grove covers five main hills, with their
valleys and the lesser runs which divide each of the five hills into
two, three, or four lesser hills. The hills radiate in a semicircle
to the north and west from the height on which the old home stands,
rolling away to the creek which bathes their feet. Here are tall, heavy
woods, without underbrush, covering the north slopes; lower, more open
woods with patches of plum, and wild crab apple trees, with some hazel
brush on all lower slopes of the hills; and finally a liberal fringe
of low, brushy trees--hawthorn, plum and crab apple trees--and dense
hazel brush on the uplands and on lower lands away from the creek.
This dense growth also fringes the county road which extends from end
to end of the grove, and it was from this roadside that towhee first
heralded his arrival from the south, during the bright days of late
March or early April. Later, when the frost had left the ground, and
his mate was growing anxious to be selecting a nesting-place, he might
be seen on the topmost twig of one of the taller small trees in every
brushy place on every hillside. I have sometimes wondered if the towhee
household did not have some disagreement about the family name, for the
male, from his elevated perch loudly calls _towhee-e-e-e_, while his
spouse on the ground below no less vigorously reiterates _che-wink_.
But if danger seems to threaten his lordship quickly descends to join
his mate in earnest warning that this small bit of earth belongs by
right of discovery to che-wink. How earnestly both birds emphasize
their claim by the nervous fluff of the short, stiff wings and the
quick spreading of the long tail, as if the large patches of white
at its end would startle the intruder away. But the male bird does
not always confine himself to the iteration of the name he seems to
love so well. Instead of the single first syllable there may be two
or even three, no two in the same pitch. It has been a surprise to me
that persons unfamiliar with the towhee's song do not realize that the
two parts proceed from the same bird. To them the first part seems to
resemble some part of the wood thrush's song and the last part--the
_he-e-e-e_--the rattle of downy woodpecker. My ear persistently
renders the whole song, _towhee-e-e-e_, or _towhe-hee-e-e-e-e_, or _O
towhe-he-e-e-e-e-e_. Others render it _chuck burr pilla-will-a-will_.
But towhee is not limited to this variety of vocalization. Besides the
abbreviation of his _che-wink_ alarm note to _swink_, or even _wink_,
and a _chuck, chuck_, when the nest is threatened, he sometimes sings
a rarely beautiful ditty which is totally unlike any of his other
performances. I have heard it only shortly after his arrival from
the south, before his mate had joined him, and have tried in vain to
describe it. The bird moves slowly and sedately about among the fallen
leaves in a soliloquy over the happenings of the long journey just
ended, with apparently no thought of the absent mate. The manner of its
utterance indicates that this is the bird's private song, egotistic if
you please, while his tree-top rendition is evidently his altruistic
performance.
The ordinary song and call and alarm notes are well rendered in the
local names bestowed upon the bird: Towhee, che-wink, joreet, joree,
charee, pink-pink, and wink-wink. His chestnut-colored sides and lowly
habits have given him the names of ground robin and swamp robin, and
his red iris, red-eyed towhee.
Nesting begins about the first of May in northern Ohio. The nest is
almost always placed on the ground, often in a slight depression made
by the birds, rarely in a bush up to seven feet from the ground. It is
made of material easily accessible in the region of the nest, of dry
leaves for a foundation upon which plant stems, dry grass, grape-vine
bark, or like material is arranged, and the whole lined with fine
rootlets. The material will vary somewhat with locality and situation
of the nest, as a matter of course. Rarely the nest may be covered,
with the entrance in the side, but it is usually not covered. The nest
site is preferably some distance from a road or foot-path, often in
moderately deep woods where there is little underbrush, but more often
in the shrubbery fringing the woods, either on a hill-top or side hill
or bottom land. Here at Oberlin, Ohio, I have found more nests in the
low second growth near swampy places than elsewhere.
The nest complement is from three to five eggs, usually four. The egg
seems to be a rather rounded ovate, running to nearly spherical on the
one hand to elongate oval on the other. The ground color is white, not
seldom tinged with pink or blue, with sprinkling of reddish-brown dots,
spots, and blotches. It is a common experience to find eggs of the
parasitic cowbird in nests of towhee. Twice I have found nests on which
the mother towhee was serenely sitting with four eggs of the cowbird
beneath her and none of her own. Two eggs of the cowbird and two or
three of the towhee in a nest are common. Sometimes the parasitic
eggs so closely resemble those of the parent that it is not easy to
distinguish between them, but often the difference is very marked.
The towhee is a fairly common inhabitant of the whole region east of
the Rocky Mountains and north to the northern border of the United
States, breeding everywhere north of northern Alabama.