_Muscicapa gilva_, VIEILL. Ois. I, 1807, 65, pl. xxxiv. _Vireo
gilvus_, BON. Obs. Wils. 1825, no. 123.—AUD. Orn. Biog. II, pl.
cxviii.—IB. Birds Am. IV, pl. ccxli.—BAIRD, Birds N. Am. 1858,
335.—SAMUELS, Birds N. Eng. 273. _Vireosylvia gilva_, CASSIN, Pr.
A. N. Sc. 1851, 153.—SCLATER, P. Z. S. 1856, 298 (Cordova); (?)
1858, 302 (Oaxaca; June) (perhaps _V. swainsoni_).—BAIRD, Rev. Am.
B. 342. _Muscicapa melodia_, WILS. Am. Orn. V, 1812, 85, pl. xlii,
fig. 2.
[Line drawing: _Vireo gilvus._
988]
SP. CHAR. (No. 1,017 ♀) Above olive-green, strongly glossed with ashy;
the head and nape above more distinctly ashy, but without decided line
of demarcation behind, and without dusky edge; rump pure olive. Stripe
from nostrils over eye to nape, eyelids, and space below eye,
creamy-white. A rather dusky post-ocular and loral spot, the latter
not extending to the bill. Under parts white, with tinge of
greenish-yellow (occasionally of creamy fulvous or buff), especially
on breast; sides more olivaceous. Crissum and axillars scarcely more
yellowish. Quills and rectrices wood-brown, edged internally with
whitish, externally with olivaceous, except perhaps on longer
primaries. Edge of wing white. Larger wing-coverts grayish-brown, with
paler edges, and no trace of olivaceous. Bill horn-color above, paler
below.
First quill very short or spurious; second about equal to, generally
rather longer than sixth; third longest; fourth, then fifth a little
shorter.
Fresh specimen: Total length, 5.33; expanse of wings, 8.35; wing from
carpal joint 2.85. Prepared specimen: Total length, 4.80; wing, 2.75;
tail, 2.25. Sexes alike. Iris brown.
HAB. Eastern North America to Fort Simpson. Cordova and Oaxaca only
southern localities recorded. Not West Indian.
A very young bird has a very cottony plumage, and differs in tints,
having the top of the head and the nape a soft whitish isabella-color,
this tingeing the back; the lower parts are wholly unsoiled white; the
middle and secondary coverts are obscurely tipped with light brown,
forming two indistinct bands across the wing.
A specimen (No. 54,262) from Orizaba is, in positively every respect,
exactly intermediate between this species and _V. josephæ_ of Costa
Rica, Ecuador, etc. (See footnote on page 360.) The crown is brown,
decidedly darker than, and different in tint from, the back, but less
so than in _josephæ_; the back is less olive than in the latter, and
less gray than in the former. The lower parts are more yellow than in
_gilvus_, and less so than in _josephæ_, the superciliary stripe
whiter and extending farther back than in the former, and less pure
white and shorter than in the latter, etc.
HABITS. The Warbling Vireo has only a slightly less extended
distribution than the Red-eyed, being found throughout all Eastern
North America, as far north as Fort Simpson and Selkirk Settlement,
and west to the Missouri River, and breeding as far south as
Louisiana. It is stated by Audubon to be found on the Columbia River,
but in this he probably referred to the Western race, _V. swainsoni_.
That writer never observed this species in Louisiana or Kentucky, nor
in the maritime part of Georgia, and its manner of entering the United
States he was unable to ascertain. Where it moves to in the winter is
also unknown, none having been met with in the West Indies, and only
at a few points in Mexico, Cordova, Oaxaca, and the State of Vera
Cruz. It was, however, found breeding at Calcasieu, Louisiana, by Mr.
Würdemann.
It breeds abundantly from Virginia to Nova Scotia, and throughout the
Northwestern States. West of the Rocky Mountains it is replaced by a
closely allied species, the _V. swainsoni_. This Vireo, more than any
other of its genus, if not exclusively, is to a large extent a
resident of villages, towns, and even cities. It is by far the
sweetest singer that ventures within their crowded streets and public
squares,—although Mr. Cassin gives his preference to the notes of the
Red-eyed,—and the melody of its song is exquisitely soft and
beautiful. It is chiefly to be found among the tall trees, in the
vicinity of dwellings, where it seems to delight to stay, and from
their highest tops to suspend its pensile nest. It is especially
abundant among the elms on Boston Common, where at almost any hour of
the day, from early in the month of May until long after summer has
gone, may be heard the prolonged notes of this, one of the sweetest
and most constant of our singers. Its voice is not powerful, but its
melody is flute-like and tender. Throughout the last of May, and in
June and July, their charming song may be heard amid the din of the
city from earliest dawn till nightfall, and rarely ceases even in the
noontide heat, when all other birds are silent. It is ever in motion,
while thus singing; and its sweetest notes are given forth as it moves
among the tree-tops in search of insects. It is not only one of our
most constant singers, but it remains musical almost until its
departure for the South in October.
The Warbling Vireo appears in the Middle States about the 15th of
April, and reaches New England early in May. The path of its northern
migrations, and of its return, is somewhat in doubt. It is abundant in
winter, according to Sumichrast, about Orizaba, and probably enters
Texas and passes north and east along the Mississippi and the Ohio
Rivers. In certain portions of the country this species is evidently
on the increase, becoming more and more common as the country is
settled, and towns and villages spring up.
The Warbling Vireo builds its nest usually in more elevated positions
than any others of this family. For the most part in the vicinity of
dwellings, often over frequented streets, they suspend their
elaborately woven and beautiful little basket-like nest, secure from
intrusion from their human neighbors, and protected by the near
presence of man from all their more dreaded enemies. Audubon narrates,
in an interesting manner, the building of their nest by a pair of
these birds on a poplar-tree, near his window, in Camden, N. J. It was
suspended between the body of the tree and a branch coming out at an
acute angle. The pair were at work, morning and evening, eight days,
first attaching slender blades of grass to the knots on the branch and
the bark of the trunk, and thence working downward and outward. They
varied their materials, from time to time, until at last he traced
them, after a prolonged absence, to a distant haystack, from which
they brought fine, slender, dry grasses, with which they completed and
lined their nest.
The nests of the Warbling Vireo, while they resemble closely those of
the other species in all the characteristics of this well-marked
family, are yet, as a rule, more carefully, neatly, and closely built.
They are usually suspended at the height of from thirty to fifty feet,
in the fork of twigs, under and near the extremity of the tree-top,
often an elm, protected from the sun and storm by a canopy of leaves,
and quite out of reach of most enemies. They vary little in size,
being about two inches in height and three and a half in their
greatest diameter, narrowing, toward their junction with the twigs, to
two inches. They are all secured in a very firm manner to the twigs
from which they are suspended by a felting of various materials,
chiefly soft, flexible, flax-like strips of vegetable fibres, leaves,
stems of plants, and strips of bark. With these are interwoven, and
carried out around the outer portions of the nest, long strips of soft
flexible bark of deciduous trees. They are softly and compactly filled
in and lined with fine stems of plants.
The eggs are usually five in number, and, like those of all the
Vireos, are of a brilliant crystal-white, sparingly spotted at the
larger end with markings of dark brown, and others of a lighter shade.
They are less marked with spots than usual in the genus, and are often
entirely unspotted, and pure white. Occasionally, however, they are
found with well-marked blotches of reddish-brown. They vary in length
from .75 to .70 of an inch, and average about .55 in their breadth.
Vireosylvia gilvus, var. swainsoni, BAIRD.