Life Histories of North American Wood Warblers, Part One and Part Two. Arthur Cleveland Bent
14⁄5 seconds, the first note being either equal to or shorter than the second. The second note is often twice as long as the first. In some songs the second note is broken into two notes, and in one record it is in four short notes, so that the song is essentially like that of the golden-winged warbler.
“After the birds have been on the breeding grounds for a week or two, singing of the nesting song begins. This song has the same buzz-like quality as the other, but it is exceedingly variable, considerably longer, and hardly ever twice alike. The song often begins with a series of short notes, like tsit tsit tsit, or contains such notes somewhere in the middle. There are usually long buzzes that change pitch by slurring upward or downward. On one occasion, I found a bird that sang a territory song and four different nesting songs. Often the nesting song is sung in flight. By June this song is heard about as frequently as the territory song, and in late summer, after the molt, it is the one most commonly heard.
“The song of this bird is heard from its arrival in spring until early July, when it ceases for a time. It is usually revived in late July or early August, and from then on may be heard fairly frequently until the birds depart about the last of August.”
In his notes sent to Dr. Chapman, Burns describes the song as, “a drowsy, locust-like, swe-e-e-e-e ze-e-e-e-e, the first apparently inhaled and the last exhaled. * * * Another song heard on the first day of arrival, on one occasion, uttered by several males in company, possibly transients here, and may be the mating song, suggests the Chickadee’s che-de-de-e, che-dee-e, and che-de-de-dee, uttered repeatedly in one form or other in excitement, and while running out on the branchlets. The call and alarm note is a rather weak chip.” Dr. Chapman (1912) records a longer song, heard later in the season as “wēē-chĭ-chĭ-chĭ-chĭ, chūr, chēē-chūr.”
Francis H. Allen tells me that the final note, ze-e-e-e-e, as rendered by Burns, “is really a very rapid series of pips, as if the bird had lips like ours and vibrated them by forcing the air through them—in other words, giving a sort of avian Bronx cheer, but high in pitch. The individual pip notes are clear, but the effect of the rapid succession is somewhat buzzy.”
The songs of the hybrid forms may be like the song of either parent form, more often like that of the goldenwing, or a mixture of the two.
The flight song, as heard by Frank A. Pitelka, is recorded as follows:
tsee-
zweé- zweé
tzip- tzip-
zee-zee-zee-zee-zee-zee- zee-zee-zee-zee-zee-zee-
The song of the blue-winged warbler is one of the high-frequency songs; Albert E. Brand (1938) gives the approximate mean as 7,675, the highest note about 8,050 and the lowest note about 7,125 vibrations per second; this compares with an approximate mean for the black-poll warbler of 8,900 vibrations per second, the highest frequency of any of the wood warblers, and an average for all passerine birds of about 4,000 vibrations per second.
Field marks.—A small warbler with a greenish olive back, yellow forehead and under parts, with a black line through the eye and two white wing bars, is a blue-winged warbler. The female is merely more dull in coloration than the male, and the young even duller. The hybrids between this and the golden-winged warbler are more puzzling, but in a general way they can be recognized; a nearly typical blue-winged warbler with a black throat is probably a Lawrence’s warbler; and a golden-winged warbler without a black throat or cheek and with a variable amount of white and yellow on the under parts and in the wing-bars, is probably a Brewster’s warbler. But there is an immense amount of individual variation between the two species, due to frequent crossing.
Fall.—Most of the blue-winged warblers move southward during August and September, though a few may linger in the southern part of the breeding range into October. Professor Cooke (1904) says: “Most of the individuals of the species migrate across the Gulf of Mexico, apparently avoiding Florida on the east and Texas and Vera Cruz on the west, as there is no record of the occurrence of this warbler in fall in Texas, and but one in Florida—that of a bird taken at Key West August 30, 1887.” But this remains to be proved.
Alexander F. Skutch writes to me: “This is another very rare migrant in Central America. It has been recorded only a few times in Guatemala and apparently not at all in Costa Rica. I have seen it only once, on the Finca Mocá, Guatemala, on October 30, 1934.”
Very little seems to be known about its winter distribution and still less about its winter habits.
DISTRIBUTION
Range.—Eastern United States to Panamá.
Breeding range.—The blue-winged warbler breeds north to southeastern Minnesota (Lanesboro); southern Wisconsin (Mazomanie, Prairie du Sac, and Glarus); northeastern Illinois (Rockford, Deerfield, and La Grange); southern Michigan (possibly Hastings, and Ann Arbor); northern Ohio (Toledo, Lakeside, Cleveland, and Austinburg); southern Pennsylvania (Carlisle); southern New York (Ossining and Whaley Lake); and Massachusetts (Springfield and Sudbury). East to eastern Massachusetts (Sudbury and Lexington); Connecticut (Westfield and Saybrook); Long Island (Mastic and Oyster Bay); New Jersey (Demarest, Morristown, and Elizabeth); southeastern Pennsylvania (Tinicum and Berwyn); probably occasionally in northern Maryland (Cecil County and Sabillasville); eastern and central Ohio (Canfield and Columbus); east-central Kentucky (Berea); central Tennessee (Nashville and Fall Creek); and central northern Georgia (Young Harris). South to northern Georgia (Young Harris, Margret, and Atlanta); northeastern Alabama (Long Island); central Tennessee (Wildersville); and northwestern Arkansas (Pettigrew and Winslow). West to northwestern Arkansas (Winslow and Fayetteville); west-central Iowa (Warrensburg); eastern Iowa (Lacey, Grinnell, Winthrop, and McGregor); and southeastern Minnesota (Lanesboro). The blue-winged warbler has occurred in summer west to eastern Kansas (Emporia and Leavenworth); central-southern and eastern Nebraska (Red Cloud, Plattsmouth, and Omaha); western Iowa (Sioux City); and north to Minnesota (Minneapolis); southern Ontario (Point Pelee, Strathroy, and West Lake); central New York (Penn Yan and Auburn); and southern New Hampshire (Manchester).
Winter range.—The principal winter home of the blue-winged warbler seems to be in Guatemala, though it has been recorded in winter from the Valley of Mexico; Puebla (Metlatoyuca); Veracruz (Tres Zapotes); to eastern Nicaragua (Río Escondido and Greytown). There is one winter record each from Costa Rica (Bonilla), Panamá (Port Antonio), and Colombia (Santa Marta Region).
On January 6, 1900, a dead blue-winged warbler (apparently dead from starvation) was picked up in Bronx Park, New York. It had only recently died and in all probability was the bird seen on December 10, in the same region.
Migration.—Late dates of spring departure are: Colombia—Santa Marta Region, March 21. Veracruz—Jalapa, April 7. Florida—Pensacola, April 25. Alabama—Guntersville, May 2. District of Columbia—Washington, May 30. Louisiana—Monroe, April 27. Texas—San Antonio, May 12.
Early dates of spring arrival are: Florida—Pensacola, April 4. Alabama—Shelby, April 4. Georgia—Atlanta, March 26. North Carolina—Arden, April 18. District of Columbia—Washington, April 23. West Virginia—Wheeling, April 23. Pennsylvania—Germantown, April 25. New York—Yonkers, April 26. Massachusetts—Lexington, May 6. Mississippi—Bay St. Louis, March 13. Louisiana—New Orleans, March 23. Arkansas—Winslow, April 2. Tennessee—Nashville, April 7. Kentucky—Eubank, April 10. Illinois—Springfield, April 29. Ohio—Columbus, April 22. Michigan—Ann Arbor, May 1. Missouri—St. Louis, April 17. Iowa—Grinnell, April 28. Wisconsin—Reedsburg, April 30. Minnesota—Lanesboro, May 7. Texas—Cove, March 27. Kansas—Onaga, April 26.
Late dates of fall departure are: Minnesota—Lanesboro, September 1. Wisconsin—Elkhorn, September 19. Iowa—Giard, September 20. Missouri—Monteer, September 17. Arkansas—Winslow, September 18. Louisiana—Monroe, October 7. Michigan—Jackson, September 13. Ohio—Oberlin, September 27. Indiana—Bloomington, September 28. Illinois—Chicago, September 29. Kentucky—Bowling Green, October 5. Tennessee—Memphis, September 11. Mississippi—Deer