_Motacilla maculosa_, GM. Syst. Nat. I, 1788, 984. _Sylvia m._ LATH.;
VIEILL.; BON.; NUTT.; AUD. Orn. Biog. I, II, V, pl. 1. 123.
_Sylvicola m._ SWAINS.; BON.; AUD. Birds Am. II, pl. xcvi.
_Rhimanphus m._ CAB. Jour. III, 1855, 474 (Cuba). _Dendroica m._
BAIRD, Birds N. Am. 1858, 284; Review, 206.—SCLATER, P. Z. S.
1859, 363, 373 (Xalapa).—BRYANT, Pr. Bost. Soc. VII, 1859
(Bahamas).—SCLATER & SALVIN, Ibis, 1859, 11 (Guatemala).—LAWRENCE,
Ann. N. Y. Lyc. 1861, 322 (Panama; winter).—GUNDLACH, Cab. Jour.
1861, 326 (Cuba; very rare).—SAMUELS, 238. _Sylvia magnolia_,
WILS. III, pl. xxiii, fig. 3.
SP. CHAR. _Male, in spring._ Bill dark bluish-black, rather lighter
beneath. Tail dusky. Top of head light grayish-blue. Front, lore,
cheek, and a stripe under the eye, black, running into a large
triangular patch on the back between the wings, which is also black.
Eyelids and a stripe from the eye along the head white. Upper
tail-coverts black, some of the feathers tipped with grayish. Abdomen
and lower tail-coverts white. Rump and under parts, except as
described, yellow. Lower throat, breast, and sides streaked with
black; the streaks closer on the lower throat and fore breast. Lesser
wing-coverts, and edges of the wing and tail, bluish-gray, the former
spotted with black. Quills and tail almost black; the latter with a
square patch of white on the inner webs of all the tail-feathers (but
the two inner) beyond the middle of the tail. Two white bands across
the wings (sometimes coalesced into one) formed by the middle and
secondary coverts. Part of the edge of the inner webs of the quills
white. Feathers margining the black patch on the back behind and on
the sides tinged with greenish. Length, 5 inches; wing, 2.50; tail,
2.25. Autumnal males differ in absence of black of back, front, sides
of head, and to a considerable degree beneath, and in much less white
on the wings and head.
_Female in spring._ Similar, but all the colors duller. Black of the
back restricted to a central triangular patch.
HAB. Eastern Province of North America to Fort Simpson; Eastern Mexico
to Guatemala and Panama; Bahamas; Cuba (very rare).
HABITS. The Black and Yellow Warbler, one of the most beautiful of
this attractive family, was supposed by our earlier writers to be
exceedingly rare. Wilson never met with more than two specimens,—one
in Ohio, the other on the Mississippi,—and spoke of it as a very
scarce species. In regard to its song he was quite at fault, denying
to it any notes deserving the name of song. Nuttall, who had only seen
it occasionally in Massachusetts, in the middle of May, regarded it as
rare, and was unacquainted with its notes. Its history is now much
better known, and neither its great rarity nor its deficiency as to
melody can any longer be admitted.
At certain seasons and in particular places it is a very common
species. It may be found during the breeding-season throughout North
America east of the Great Plains, between latitude 44° and Fort
Simpson in the fur country. During its migrations it may be met with
in most of the Eastern States, in Eastern Mexico, and the northern
portions of South America. It has been found in the Bahamas, and also
in Cuba, where it is not common. Specimens have been received from
Mexico, Guatemala, and Panama, and from Fort Resolution, Rupert House,
and Fort Simpson, in Arctic America, and as far to the west as the
mouth of Vermilion River. Dr. Bryant met with it in the Bahamas as
early as the 15th of March, where it was quite common. M. Boucard
found it at Playa Vicente, in the hot portion of the State of Oaxaca,
Mexico.
In Western Massachusetts, Mr. Allen found it a common spring and
autumn visitor, occurring in its northern flights from the middle of
May to the first of June, and in the autumn as late as September 20.
Professor Verrill found it in Western Maine, but not common, both in
spring and fall, but had no reason to believe that it bred there. Mr.
Boardman does not include it in his list of Calais birds, and I did
not find it among the islands in the Bay of Fundy. In the vicinity of
Halifax, during the months of June and July, it is one of the most
common of the Warblers, occurring in every direction.
Mr. Audubon observed these Warblers in Louisiana, in their migrations,
as early as the middle of March; but its appearance there, as well as
in Kentucky and Ohio, appeared to be occasional and accidental. In
autumn he has met with them in large numbers among the mountains of
Northern Pennsylvania, They were passing southward with their young.
While on his way to Labrador he noticed them in Maine, near Eastport,
in May, very abundant along the roads, the fields, and the low woods,
as well as in the orchards and gardens. The season was then not
advanced, the weather cold; and these birds sheltered themselves by
night among the evergreens, and were often so chilled as to be readily
taken by the hand. He also met them wherever he landed in the
neighboring islands in the Bay of Fundy and at Labrador.
The song of this Warbler is clear and sweetly modulated, and surpasses
that of most of this family. It seems to prefer the interior of low
woods, where its notes may chiefly be heard during the early summer,
as it sings while it is searching for its food among the branches, in
the manner of the Vireos.
Like nearly all the members of this family, in its search for food it
blends the habits of the Creepers with those of the Flycatchers,
feeding upon insects in their every form, running up and down the
trunks for the ova, larvæ, and pupæ, expertly catching the insect on
the wing, and equally skilful in hovering over the expanded bud and
searching the opening leaves.
Mr. Audubon found its nest placed deep among the branches of low
fir-trees, supported by horizontal twigs, constructed of moss and
lichens, and lined with fibrous roots and feathers. One found in
Labrador, in the beginning of July, contained five eggs, small and
rather more elongated than is common in this genus. They were white,
and sprinkled with reddish dots at the larger end. The female
fluttered among the branches, spreading her wings and tail in great
distress, and returning to her nest as soon as the intruders were a
few yards off. In August he saw a number of their young already
following their parents and moving southward. In his expedition to
Texas, Mr. Audubon again met this bird, in considerable numbers, early
in April. Their eggs, he states, measure three fourths of an inch in
length by nine sixteenths in breadth. In some the ground-color,
instead of pure white, is of a yellowish tinge.
The writer found this Warbler abundant near Halifax in the early
summer of 1850, frequenting the thick hemlock woods, confiding in its
habits, unsuspicious, and easily approached. The distress, as
described by Audubon, manifested in behalf of its own young, it is as
ready to exhibit when the nest of a feathered neighbor is disturbed. A
pair of Hudson’s Bay Titmice, protesting against the invasion of their
home, by their outcries brought a pair of these Warblers to their
sympathetic assistance; and the latter manifested, in a more gentle
way, quite as much distress and anxiety as the real parents. With
expanded tail and half-extended wings they fluttered overhead among
the branches, approaching us almost within reach, uttering the most
piteous outcries.
Sir John Richardson found this Warbler as common and as familiar as
the _D. æstiva_ on the Saskatchewan, and greatly resembling it in
habits, though gifted with a much more varied and agreeable song.
Mr. Kennicott met this Warbler on Great Slave Lake, June 12, 1860,
where he obtained a female, nest, and five eggs. The nest, loosely
built, was placed in a small spruce about two feet from the ground,
and in thick woods. The bird was rather bold, coming to her nest while
he stood by it. This nest was only one and a half inches deep, with a
diameter of three and a half inches; the cavity only one inch deep,
with a diameter of two and a half inches. It was made almost entirely
of fine stems of plants and slender grasses, and a few mosses. The
cavity was lined with finer stems, and fine black roots of herbaceous
plants.
The eggs of this Warbler are, in shape, a rounded oval, one end being
but slightly more pointed than the other. They measure .62 of an inch
in length and .49 in breadth. Their ground-color is a light ashen hue,
or a dull white, and this is more or less sprinkled with fine dots and
blotches of a light brown. For the most part these are grouped in a
ring about the larger end.
Mr. R. Deane, of Cambridge, found this bird breeding near Lake
Umbagog. Its nest was in the fork of a low spruce about three feet
from the ground. The nest contained four eggs, and was made of dry
grasses, spruce twigs, and rootlets. It was lined with fine black
roots, being a rather coarse structure for a Warbler. The eggs were
nearly spherical, averaging .62 by .51 of an inch. Their ground-color
was a creamy-white, sparsely marked with a few large blotches of lilac
and umber.
Dendroica cærulea, BAIRD.