A History of North American Birds; Land Birds; Vol. 2 of 3 — John Shaqi
A History of North American Birds; Land Birds; Vol. 2 of 3Baird, Spencer Fullerton
Science
A History of North American Birds; Land Birds; Vol. 2 of 3
Baird, Spencer Fullerton
Birds -- North America
HABITS. The common Song Sparrow of eastern North America has an
extended range of distribution, and is resident throughout the year in
a large part of the area in which it breeds. It nests from about South
Carolina north to the British Provinces of Nova Scotia and New
Brunswick at the east, and to a not well-defined limit in British
America. The most northern points to which it has been traced are the
plains of the Saskatchewan and the southern shore of Lake Winnepeg, in
which latter place Mr. Kennicott found it breeding. It is said by Dr.
Coues to breed in South Carolina, and by Mr. Audubon in Louisiana, but
I have never seen any of their eggs from any point south of
Washington. In winter it is found from Massachusetts, where only a few
are observed, to Florida. It is most abundant at this period in North
and South Carolina. It is not mentioned in Dr. Gerhardt’s list as
being found in Northern Georgia at any season of the year. Mr. Ridgway
informs me that it does not breed in Southern Illinois. Its song is
not popularly known there, though he has occasionally heard it just
before these Sparrows were leaving for the north. This species winters
there in company with the _Z. albicollis_ and _Z. leucophrys_,
associating with the former, and inhabiting brush-heaps in the
clearings.
To Massachusetts, where specimens have been taken in every month of
the year, and where they have been heard to sing in January, they
return in large numbers usually early in March, sometimes even in
February. It is probable that these are but migrants, passing farther
north, and that our summer visitants do not appear among us until the
middle of April, or just as they are about to breed. They reach Maine
from the 15th to the 25th, and breed there the middle of May. In
Massachusetts they do not have eggs until the first week in May,
except in very remarkable seasons, usually not until after the
Bluebird has already hatched out her first brood, and a week later
than the Robin.
The tide of returning emigration begins to set southward early in
October. Collecting in small loose flocks, probably all of each group
members of the same family, they slowly move towards the south. As one
set passes on, another succeeds, until the latter part of November,
when we no longer meet with flocks, but solitary individuals or groups
of two or three. These are usually a larger and stouter race, and
almost suggest a different species. They are often in song even into
December. They apparently do not go far, and are the first to return.
In early March they are in full song, and their notes seem louder,
clearer, and more vibratory than those that come to us and remain to
breed.
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