Life histories of North American wood warblers, Part 1 (of 2)Bent, Arthur Cleveland
Science
Life histories of North American wood warblers, Part 1 (of 2)
Bent, Arthur Cleveland
Birds -- North America; Passeriformes; Wood warblers
The Audubon Warbler is the most widely distributed and the most abundant
of all the species of wood warblers found in the Yosemite region. It
occurs in numbers throughout the main forested districts of the
mountains during the summer season, and it frequents the deciduous trees
and brush of the foothill and valley country in the winter time.
Altitudinally its summer range extends from the beginning of the
Transition Zone yellow pines on the west slope, at 3300 to 3500 feet, up
through the lodgepole pines and other conifers of the Canadian and
Hudsonian zones to the upper limit of unstunted trees at 10,000 feet or
a little higher. * * *
During the summer season the Audubon Warbler keeps mainly to coniferous
trees, foraging from 10 to 50 feet or more above the ground. In the
Transition Zone and part of the Canadian Zone it shares this habitat
with the Hermit Warbler, but at the higher altitudes it is the only
warbler present in the evergreen forest.
Farther north, in Mono County, Calif., James B. Dixon tells me that he
found it nesting between 7,600 and 9,500 feet elevation. Referring to
the Toyabe region in Nevada, Dr. Jean M. Linsdale (1938) found the Rocky
Mountain form in a somewhat different environment: "In the mountains the
area occupied by this warbler agreed fairly well with the area covered
with trees. Individuals were seen most often in aspens, limber pines,
birches, willows, and mountain mahoganies." Angus M. Woodbury (MS.) says
of the breeding range of the Rocky Mountain form in Utah: "It summers in
altitudes ranging from about 7,000 to 10,000 feet and nests in almost
any of the components of the forests in those altitudes; pine, fir,
spruce, aspen, or oak."
In Washington, Audubon's warbler is common and well distributed from
near sea level in the vicinity of Seattle and Tacoma up to about 8,000
feet in the mountains. Near Tacoma, D. E. Brown showed us some typical
lowland haunts of this warbler in the so-called "prairie region." On
this smooth, flat land, a fine growth of firs and cedars was scattered
about in the open; the two or three local species of firs were most
abundant and were growing to perfection, being well branched down to the
ground.
_Spring._--There is a northward as well as an altitudinal migration in
the spring. Samuel F. Rathbun says in his notes from Seattle: "Although
the Audubon's is of frequent if not regular occurrence during the
winter, a migration of the bird through the region is to be noted each
spring and fall." Near Seattle the first birds are seen and their song
is heard about March 10 to 15, and numbers are seen passing through up
to the latter part of April. "By way of comparison, in the Lake Crescent
section the first are seen about April 2, at the earliest, and after
three weeks the last appear to have passed by, as the species performs
its spring migration in a leisurely manner." A later wave of migrants
passes through Seattle between April 10 and 25, probably birds that nest
farther north.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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