Part 25

General Range.—Western interior districts of United States and Canada; breeding from North Dakota and Manitoba west to interior of British Columbia and southward to Nevada, Utah and Colorado; southward during migrations thru Arizona, etc., to Brazil, also thru the Mississippi Valley and, casually, eastward.

Range in Washington.—Summer resident in the hilly districts of northwestern Washington,—Blue Mountains(?).

Authorities.—Howe, Auk, XVII. Jan. 1900, p. 19 (Spokane). T(?). J.

Specimens.—Prov.

The Willow Thrush shares with its even more retiring cousin, the Olive-back, the forests of the northwestern portion of the State. Here it may be found in the seclusion of spring draws and alder bottoms, or in the miscellaneous cover which lines the banks of the larger streams. It is confined almost entirely to the vicinity of water, and spends much of its time on the damp ground poking among the fallen leaves and searching the nooks and corners of tree-roots. Since the bird is but a flitting shade, one cannot easily determine its color-pattern, and must learn rather the range and quality of its notes. The bird _is_, rather than _has_, a voice, an elusive voice, a weird and wonderful voice. And only after one has heard the song, with its reverberant, sweet thunder, and its exquisitely diminishing cadences, as it wells up at eventide from some low thicket, may one be said to know the Willow Thrush.

For the most part the bird betrays interest in your movements by a subdued _yewi_, a note of complaint and admonition, variously likened to a grunt, a bleat, or a nasal interjection. Not infrequently this becomes a clearly whistled _wheé-ew_; and this, in turn, is varied and strengthened to _ve-er-u_, or _Veery_, whence the common name of the typical form, _H. fuscescens_, in the East. The song proper consists of six or seven of these _ve-er-ys_, rolled out with a rich and inimitable brogue. The notes vibrate and resound, and fill the air so full of music that one is led to suspect the multiple character of each. The bird is really striking chords, and the sounding strings still vibrate when the next is struck. There is, moreover, in the whole performance, a musical crescendo coupled with a successive lowering of pitch, which is fairly ravishing in its impression of mystery and power.

The distribution of this species is as yet imperfectly made out. Having made its acquaintance at Spokane and along the valley of the Pend d’Oreille, we were able to recognize it later at Chelan and Stehekin, the latter unquestionably the westernmost record of its occurrence in the United States. Whether it may also extend further south along the east front of the Cascades, remains to be seen.

A nest before me was taken by Mr. Fred S. Merrill, in Spokane. It was placed in the crotch of an alder at a height of two feet, and contained, on the ninth day of June, four slightly incubated eggs. The nest is a rather loosely constructed affair of bark-strips, dead leaves, coarse grasses, shavings, leaf-stems, etc., and has a careless lining of dessicated leaves and broken grasses. The matrix of mud, or leaf-mold, which gives strength and consistency to the nests of certain other thrushes, is conspicuously lacking in this one. The brooding hollow is only three inches from brim to brim, by one and three-quarters in depth. The eggs are in every way miniature Robins’, being without spots, and representing only three-fifths or two-thirds the bulk of those of the larger bird.

No. 93. RUSSET-BACKED THRUSH.

A. O. U. No. 758. Hylocichla ustulata (Nutt.).

Synonym.—“Wood Thrush” (name properly restricted to _H. mustelina_ of the East).

Description.—_Adults_: Above olive-brown, substantially uniform; a conspicuous orbital ring of pale buff; sides of head buffy mingled or streaked with olive-brown; chin, throat and chest buff (or lightening to buffy white toward chin); sides of throat and entire chest with triangular marks of deep olive-brown, smaller and narrower on throat, larger and broader (sector-shaped) posteriorly; breast, especially on sides, transversely spotted with light brown; sides and flanks heavily marked with brownish; remaining underparts white. Bill blackish, paling basally on mandible; feet and legs brown; iris brown. _Winter_ specimens are brighter, more deeply tinged with buff before and with under tail-coverts buffy. _Young birds_ are more or less marked and streaked with buffy and tawny above and the markings of underparts are mostly transverse. Length 6.50-7.50 (165.1-190.5); wing 3.83 (97); tail 2.87 (73); bill .54 (13.7); tarsus 1.10 (28).

Recognition Marks.—Sparrow size; uniform olive-brown above; heavy spotting and buffy wash on chest; sides of head and eye-ring buffy; brown above as compared with _H. u. swainsonii_.

Nesting.—_Nest_: of bark-strips, moss and grasses, with a heavy inner mat or mould of dead leaves, lined with rootlets and fine grasses; placed usually at moderate heights in bushes or saplings of thickets, sometimes 30-60 feet high in trees. _Eggs_: 3-5, usually 4, greenish blue or dull grayish blue dotted and spotted, rather sparingly, with various shades of brown. Av. size, .93 × .67 (23.6 × 17). _Season_: June, July; one or two broods.

General Range.—Pacific coast district from southern California to Alaska (Juneau), breeding thruout its range; south in winter thru Mexico to Central and northern South America.

Range in Washington.—Common summer resident and migrant west of the Cascade Mountains; probably overflows thru mountain passes to at least the eastern slopes of the Cascades.

Authorities.—_Turdus ustulatus_ Nuttall, Man. Orn. U. S. and Canada, Land Birds, ed. 2, 1840, pp. VI. 830 (Columbia River). C&S. L¹. Rh. D¹. Kb. Ra. D². Ss². Kk. B. E.

Specimens.—U. of W. P¹(?). Prov. B. BN. E.

Artists of the later schools agree that shadows are not often black, as they have been conventionally represented for centuries. Their deepest color note is always that of the ground, or screen, which bears them. The Thrush, therefore, is the truest embodiment of woodland shade, for the shifting russets of its upperparts melt and blend with the tints of fallen leaves, dun roots, and the shadows of tree-boles cast on the brown ashes of fallen comrades. Not content, either, with such protective guarantee, this gentle spirit clings to cover, and reveals itself only as a flitting shade and a haunting voice. Now and then a brown gleam does cross some open space in the forest, but the action is hasty and the necessity much regretted.

The Russet-backed Thrush is not much given to song, altho on occasion the woodside may ring with the simple melody of its _wee loo weelo weeloeee_[35]. Other notes are more notable and characteristic; and by these one may trace the bird’s every movement without recourse to sight. _Quit_, or _hwit_, is a soft whistled note of inquiry and greeting, by which the birds keep in constant touch with each other, and which they are nowise disinclined to use in conversations with strangers. _Hwootaylyochtyl_ is the name which the Quillayute lad gives the bird, the first syllable being whistled rather than spoken, in imitation of the bird’s note. At the friendly call the Thrush comes sidling over toward you thru the brush, until you feel that you could put your hand on it if you would; but the bird remains invisible, and says, _quit, quit_, with some asperity, if you disregard the _convenances_.

A longer call-note, of sharper quality, _queee_, may be as readily imitated, altho its meaning in the bush is uncertain. The bird has also a spoken note, a sort of happy purring, which I call the _coordaddy_ cry. In this the _daddy_ notes are given in from one to six syllables, and are spoken “trippingly on the tongue.”

Recalling again the _queee_ note, we are surprised to find that it is the commonest sound heard during migrations. At midnight when a solemn hush is over all besides, this weird note comes down from the sky at any height, from every angle, a greeting _en passant_ from the voyageurs, the tenderest, the most pathetic, the most mysterious voice of Nature. There are a dozen variations of pitch and tone, _quééé, quee, kooo_, etc., but the theme is one, and the quality is that of the Russet-backed Thrush. Now it is incredible that any one species should so abound to the exclusion of all others, or that one alone should speak, while others flit by silently. Moreover, the intermittent utterance of a single bird proclaims the rate at which that bird is moving, and oftener argues for the passing of the smaller species, Warblers and the like. Repeated observation would make it appear certain that this _quee_ note is the common possession of many, perhaps of all species of migrant song birds, a sort of Esperanto for “Ho, Comrade!” by which the flying legions of the night are bound together in a great fellowship.

Much of the apparent difference in the call-notes of these night-birds is explained when we remember that they are reaching us from different angles. Thus, the _quee_ of a rapidly approaching bird is raised sharply and shortened, _quĕĕ_; while the same voice, in passing, falls to a ghostly _kwoo_, at least a musical third below. It is, perhaps, needless to add that practiced lips may join this mystic chorus and hold delightful converse with these brothers of the air—may, indeed, provoke them to trebled utterance in passing.

But only the Russet-backed Thrush may repeat this cabalistic note, by day. He is the bugler in that greatest of all armies and he must needs keep in practice while on furlough.

Russet-backs are tardy migrants, seldom arriving before the first week in May; and they are off again for the Southland by the first week in September. Two instances are on record, however, of the bird’s wintering hereabouts. On the 7th of March, 1891, several birds were “engaged in conversation” by the writer near Tacoma; and on the 22nd of January, 1907, two birds were encountered on the University grounds in Seattle. In the latter instance the birds would not disclose themselves, altho they passed half way around me in the thicket, uttering their characteristic and unmistakable notes.

In home building this Thrush makes no effort at nest concealment, trusting rather to the seclusion of its haunts. The materials which enter into the construction of the nest are themselves in a measure protective, especially in those numerous instances in which the exterior is composed entirely of green moss. At other times, twigs, bark-strips, and grasses are used; but the two things which give character to the nest of this Thrush are the mud-cup, or matrix, of mud and leaf-mold, and the lining of dried leaf-skeletons. I have surprised a mother Russet at her task of cup-moulding, and verily her bib was as dirty as that of any child making mud pies. For altho the beak serves for hod and trowel, the finishing touches, the actual moulding, must be accomplished by pressure of the bird’s breast.

During a season’s nesting at Glacier, in the Mount Baker district, Mr. D. E. Brown located about a hundred sets of the Russet-backed Thrush, taking no account of nests in other stages of occupation. In distance from the ground, nests varied from six inches to forty feet, altho a four or five foot elevation was about the average. Nests were found in thickets, where they were supported by the interlacing of branches, or else saddled upon the inclined stems of vine maples, or in fir trees. In the last-named places, nests might be set against the trunk on a horizontal limb, but were more often at some distance from it. The birds were very sensitive about molestation before eggs were laid, and would desert a nest in process of construction on the merest suspicion that a stranger had looked into it. After deposition, however, the mother Thrush was found to be very devoted to her charges, and great confidence was often engendered by carefully considered advances.

At Glacier, nest-building averaged to commence about the 25th of May, and the first eggs were found on the 1st of June. The last set was found July 15th. All nests examined in the earlier part of the season contained four eggs; those found later, presumably second efforts, never had more than three.

As a curious example of the use of the imagination on the part of early writers, take this from our venerated Cooper[36]: “The eggs, unlike those of most thrushes, are white, spotted thickly with brown, and four or five in number.” The brown spotting is all right and an unpigmented shell is not an impossibility, but deviations from the characteristic greenish blue of the ground-color have not since been reported.

No. 94. OLIVE-BACKED THRUSH.

A. O. U. No. 758 a. Hylocichla ustulata swainsonii (Cab.).

Synonyms.—Swainson’s Thrush. Eastern Olive-back. Alma’s Thrush (_H. u. almæ_ Oberh., disallowed by A. O. U. Com.).

Description.—_Adults_: Similar to _H. ustulata_ but grayer and more olivaceous; “color of upperparts varying from olive to grayish hair brown in summer, from deep olive to slightly brownish olive in winter”; ground color of underparts lighter buffy (yellowish buff or creamy buff); sides and flanks grayish—instead of brownish-olive. Size of last.

Recognition Marks.—As in preceding; grayer above, lighter buffy below.

Nesting.—_Nest_ and _Eggs_ indistinguishable from those of typical form, _H. ustulata_.

General Range.—North America in general except Pacific coast district south of Cross Sound and Lynn Canal; breeding from the mountainous districts of the United States (especially northerly) north to limit of trees; south in winter thruout Mexico and Central America to Peru, Bolivia, etc.

Range in Washington.—Imperfectly made out as regards that of _H. ustulata_. Found breeding in the valley of the Stehekin hence presumably summer resident in timbered districts of eastern Washington.

Authorities.—Bowles and Dawson, Auk, Vol. XXV. Oct. 1908, p. 483.

Specimens.—Prov. B.

The more open woods and more abundant suns of eastern Washington effect that reduction of color in the “burnt” Thrush, which henceforth characterizes the species clear thru to the Atlantic. It would be idle to trace in detail all accompanying changes of manner and habit, but we can hardly fail to note the improved quality of the Olive-back’s song. This is most nearly comparable to that of the Willow Thrush and has something of the same rolling vibrant quality. It is, however, less prolonged and less vehement. It may or may not retain the liquid l’s, but it discards outright the rich r’s, which the Veery rolls under his tongue like sweet morsels; and the pitch of the whole rises slightly, perhaps a musical third, as the volume of sound diminishes toward the end: _We-e-o, we-e-o, we-o we-o weee_. A song heard some years ago at the head of Lake Chelan, _weeloo weeloo weelooee looee_, seemed to have all the music of perfected _swainsonii_ in it, yet it was not till the season of 1908 that Mr. Bowles established the fact of the Olive-back’s presence and the Russet-back’s absence from the Stehekin Valley. On the other hand, Ridgway finds that both forms sometimes occur together, even during the breeding season; so we are not yet prepared to make generalizations as to the relative distribution of these birds in Washington.

No. 95. ALASKA HERMIT THRUSH.

A. O. U. No. 759. Hylocichla guttata (Pallas).

Synonym.—Kadiak Dwarf Thrush (Ridgw.).

Description.—_Adult_: Upperparts plain grayish brown (hair brown to near broccoli brown) changing on rumps to dull cinnamon-brown of upper tail-coverts and tail; a prominent whitish orbital ring; sides of head mingled grayish brown and dull whitish; underparts dull white, clear only on belly,—throat and breast tinged with pale creamy buff; sides and flanks washed with pale grayish brown; throat in confluent chain on side and lower throat, chest and upper breast—spotted with dusky or sooty, the spots narrow and wedge-shaped on lower throat, broadening and deepening on chest, fading and becoming rounded on breast. Bill drab brown paling on mandible basally; feet and legs brown; iris dark brown. _Winter_ specimens are brighter and more strongly colored thruout. _Young birds_ are streaked with buffy above and the spotting of underparts inclines to bars on breast and sides. Length 6.30-7.40 (160-188); wing 3.46 (88); tail 2.52 (64); bill .50 (12.7); tarsus 1.14 (29).

Recognition Marks.—Sparrow size; cinnamon of tail (and upper-coverts) contrasting more or less with duller brown of remaining upperparts.

Nesting.—Does not breed in Washington. _Nest_ and _Eggs_ as in _H. g. sequoiensis_.

General Range.—Coast district of Alaska breeding northward and westward from Cross Sound; southward in winter as far as Texas and western Mexico, migrating chiefly coastwise.

Range in Washington.—Spring and fall migrant west of the Cascades.

Migrations.—_Spring_: Tacoma, April 15, 1905 (J. H. Bowles). _Fall_: Seattle Sept. 21, 1907 (Jennie V. Getty).

Authorities.—Bowles and Dawson, Auk, XXV. Oct. 1908, p. 483.

Specimens.—P(Alaskan). Prov. B.

About all we can certify to, so far, is that there are two varieties of the Hermit Thrush which may be seen on Puget Sound during the migrations: a lighter and grayer form, presumably from northwestern Alaska; and a darker, more warmly-tinted bird, _H. g. nana_, which may or may not summer to some extent in western Washington. Specimens so far encountered in eastern Washington are probably _H. g. sequoiensis_, en route to or from their breeding haunts in the high Cascades; while if any are ever captured in the mountains of Stevens County, they will probably prove to be of the _H. g. auduboni_ type, which prevails in the eastern portion of British Columbia.

No. 96. SIERRA HERMIT THRUSH.

A. O. U. No. 759 part. Hylocichla guttata sequoiensis (Belding).

Synonyms.—Western Hermit Thrush. Cascade Hermit Thrush. Mountain Hermit.

Description.—Similar in coloration to _H. guttata_ but larger, paler and grayer. Adult male: wing 3.65 (92.8); tail 2.83 (71.8); bill .53 (13.5); tarsus 1.12 (28.4).

Recognition Marks.—As in _H. guttata_.

Nesting.—_Nest_: of bark-strips, grasses, leaves and moss, lined with fine rootlets, placed on ground in thickets or at moderate heights in fir trees. _Eggs_: 3 or 4, greenish blue unmarked—not certainly distinguishable from those of the Willow Thrush. Av. size, .85 × .65 (21.6 × 16.5). _Season_: June, July; one brood.

General Range.—Mountains of the Cascade-Sierra system and from Mt. Whitney north thru central British Columbia, etc., to the Yukon River; south in winter to Lower California, Sonora, etc.

Range in Washington.—Common summer resident in the Cascade Mountains—further distinction undetermined.

Authorities.—Dawson, Auk, Vol. XXV. Oct. 1908, p. 483.

Specimens.—D.

When asked to name the best songster of Washington, I answer, unhesitatingly, the Hermit Thrush. It is not that the bird chooses for his home the icy slopes and stunted forests of the high Cascades, tho that were evidence enough of a poetic nature. It is not for any marked vivacity, or personal charm of the singer, that we praise his song; the bird is gentle, shy, and unassuming, and it is only rarely that one may even see him. It is not that he excels in technique such conscious artists as the Catbird, the Thrasher, and the Mockingbird; the mere comparison is odious. The song of the Hermit Thrush is a thing apart. It is sacred music, not secular. Having nothing of the dash and abandon of Wren or Ouzel, least of all the sportive mockery of the Long-tailed Chat, it is the pure offering of a shriven soul, holding acceptable converse with high heaven. No voice of solemn-pealing organ or cathedral choir at vespers ever hymns the parting day more fittingly than this appointed chorister of the eternal hills. Mounted on the chancel of some low-crowned fir tree, the bird looks calmly at the setting sun, and slowly phrases his worship in such dulcet tones, exalted, pure, serene, as must haunt the corridors of memory forever after.

You do not have to approve of the Hermit Thrush,—nor of Browning, nor of Shelley, nor of Keats. The writer once lost a subscription to “The Birds of Washington, Patrons’ Edition, De Luxe, Limited to One Hundred Copies” and all that, you know, because he ventured to defend Browning. “No; I do not want your bird-book.” Quite right, Madame, it would have been a waste of money—for you. But I have heard the Hermit Thrush.

“Ah, did you once see Shelley, plain, And did he stop and speak to you, And did you speak to him again? How strange it seems, and new!

“But you were living before that, And also you are living after; And the memory I started at— My starting moves your laughter!

“I crossed a moor with a name of its own, And a certain use in the world, no doubt, Yet a hand’s breadth of it shines alone ’Mid the blank miles around about:

“For there I picked up on the heather, And there I put inside my breast, A moulted feather, an eagle feather! Well, I forget the rest.”

No. 97. DWARF HERMIT THRUSH.

A. O. U. No. 759 c. Hylocichla guttata nana (Aud.).

Synonyms.—Pacific Hermit Thrush. Sitkan Dwarf Thrush (Ridgway).

Description.—“Similar to _H. g. guttata_ but coloration darker and browner, the color of back, etc., more sepia brown, upper tail-coverts more russet, tail more chestnut, and spots on chest larger and darker” (Ridgway). Adult male: wing 3.42 (86.8); tail 2.58 (65.5); bill .48 (12.2); tarsus 1.13 (28.8).

Recognition Marks.—As in _H. guttata_.

Nesting.—As in _H. g. sequoiensis_.

General Range.—Pacific coast district, breeding from western Oregon (presumably) north to Cross Sound, Alaska; south in winter to Southwestern States.

Range in Washington.—Probably common but little known, during migrations. Presumably resident in summer west of the Cascades.

Authorities.—? _Turdus nanus_ Audubon, Orn. Biog. V. 1839, 201 (Columbia R.) ?Townsend, Journ. Ac. Nat. Sci. Phila. VIII. 1839, 153 (Col. R.) Belding, L. B. P. D. 1890, p. 254 (Walla Walla, J. W. Williams, 1885).

Specimens.—U. of W. Prov. E.

As one passes thru the woods in middle April while the vine maples are still leafless, and the forest floor is not yet fully recovered from the brownness of the rainy season, a moving shape, a little browner still, but scarcely outlined in the uncertain light, starts up from the ground with a low _chuck_, and pauses for a moment on a mossy log. Before you have made out definite characters, the bird flits to a branch a little higher up and more removed, to stand motionless for a minute or so, or else to chuckle softly with each twinkle of the ready wings. By following quietly one may put the bird to a dozen short flights without once driving it out of range; and in so doing he may learn that the tail is abruptly rufous in contrast with the olive-brown of the back, and that the breast is more boldly and distinctly spotted than is the case with the Russet-backed Thrush.