One of the most interesting facts concerning this beautiful warbler
is that, though not common, it is a winter sojourner, and therefore
of perpetual interest to the student of birds. About the last of
March, however, multitudes of them may be seen as they begin to move
northward. By the middle of April all but a few stragglers have left
us, and it is not till the last of September that they begin to return,
the majority of them arriving about the middle of October. The habitat
of the myrtle warbler includes the whole of North America, though it is
chiefly found east of the Rocky Mountains, breeding from the northern
United States northward into the Arctic regions; and, what is regarded
as strange for so hardy a bird, has been found nesting in Jamaica. Its
winter home is from about latitude 40° south into southern Central
America.
The adult female myrtle warbler is similar to the male, but much duller
in color. In winter the plumage of the sexes is said to be essentially
alike. The upper parts are strongly washed with umber brown, and lower
parts more or less suffused with paler wash of the same. The young have
no yellow anywhere, except sometimes on the rump. The whole plumage is
thickly streaked above and below with dusky and grayish white.
The places to study these attractive warblers are the open woods and
borders of streams. In their northern winter homes, during the winter
months, spiders, eggs and larvæ of insects constitute their principal
food, though they also feed upon the berries of the poison ivy, and in
the early spring, as they move northward, upon "insects that gather
about the unfolding leaves, buds, and blossoms." Col. Goss says that
in the spring of 1880 he found the birds in large numbers on Brier
Island and other places in Nova Scotia, feeding along the beach, in
company with the horned lark, upon the small flies and other insects
that swarm about the kelp and debris washed upon the shore. "They
utter almost continually, as they flit about, a _tweet_ note, the males
often flying to the tops of the small hemlocks to give vent to their
happiness in song, which is quite loud for warblers--rather short, but
soft and pleasing."
These birds usually build their nests in low trees and bushes, but
Mr. MacFarlane, who found them nesting at Anderson River, says they
occasionally nest on the ground. Mr. Bremer says that in the summer
of 1855, early in July, he obtained a nest of the myrtle warbler in
Parsborough, Nova Scotia. It was built in a low bush, in the midst of
a small village, and contained six eggs. The parents were very shy,
and it was with great difficulty that one of them was secured for
identification. The nest was built on a horizontal branch, the smaller
twigs of which were so interlaced as to admit of being built upon them,
though their extremities were interwoven into its rim. The nest was
small for the bird, being only two inches in depth and four and a half
in diameter. The cavity was one and one-half inches deep and two and a
half wide. Its base and external portions consisted of fine, light dry
stalks of wild grasses, and slender twigs and roots. Of the last the
firm, strong rim of the nest was exclusively woven. Within the nest
were soft, fine grasses, downy feathers, and the fine hair of small
animals.
The eggs are three to six, white to greenish white, spotted and
blotched, with varying shades of umber brown to blackish and pale
lilac: in form they are rounded oval.
In autumn, when the myrtle warblers return from Canada, they mostly
haunt the regions where the juniper and bayberries are abundant.
The latter (_Myrica cerifera_), or myrtle waxberries, as they are
frequently called, and which are the favorite food of this species,
have given it their name. These warblers are so restless that great
difficulty is experienced in identifying them.
[Illustration: MYRTLE WARBLER.
Life-size.
FROM COL. F. M. WOODRUFF.
6-99
COPYRIGHT 1899,
NATURE STUDY PUB. CO., CHICAGO.]