Length -- 8 to 8.3 inches. About two inches shorter than the
robin.
Male and Female -- Brown above, reddish on head and shoulders,
shading into olive-brown on tail. Throat, breast, and
underneath white, plain in the middle, but heavily marked on
sides and breast with heart-shaped spots of very dark brown.
Whitish eye-ring.
Migrations -- Late April or early May. October. Summer resident.
When Nuttall wrote of "this solitary and retiring songster," before the
country was as thickly settled as it is to-day, it possibly had not developed
the confidence in men that now distinguishes the wood thrush from its shy
congeners that are distinctly wood birds, which it can no longer strictly be
said to be. In city parks and country places, where plenty of trees shade the
village streets and lawns, it comes near you, half hopping, half running, with
dignified unconsciousness and even familiarity, all the more delightful in a
bird whose family instincts should take it into secluded woodlands with their
shady dells. Perhaps, in its heart of hearts, it still prefers such retreats.
Many conservative wood thrushes keep to their wild haunts, and it must be
owned not a few liberals, that discard family traditions at other times, seek
the forest at nesting time. But social as the wood thrush is and abundant,
too, it is also eminently high-bred; and when contrasted with its tawny
cousin, the veery, that skulks away to hide in the nearest bushes as you
approach, or with the hermit thrush, that pours out its heavenly song in the
solitude of the forest, how gracious and full of gentle confidence it seems!
Every gesture is graceful and elegant; even a wriggling beetle is eaten as
daintily as caviare at the king's table. It is only when its confidence in you
is abused, and you pass too near the nest, that might easily be mistaken for a
robin's, just above your head in a sapling, that the wood thrush so far
forgets itself as to become excited. Pit, pit, pit, sharply reiterated, is
called out at you with a strident quality in the tone that is painful evidence
of the fearful anxiety your presence gives this gentle bird.
Too many guardians of nests, whether out of excessive happiness or excessive
stupidity, have a dangerous habit of singing very near them. Not so the wood
thrush. "Come to me," as the opening notes of its flute-like song have been
freely translated, invites the intruder far away from where the blue eggs lie
cradled in ambush. is as good a rendering into syllables of the luscious song
as could very well be made. Pure, liquid, rich, and luscious, it rings out
from the trees on the summer air and penetrates our home like
"Uoli-a-e-o-li-noli-nol-aeolee-lee! strait of music from a stringed quartette.