The young are objects of special interest to the parents, who render them every needed attention. When one is absent for food, the other stays at home to protect them from danger. Their food consists of a prepared mixture of nectar and soft insects, which they procure by thrusting their bills into the mouths of their parents. It was formerly supposed that this diet consisted entirely of the honey of flowers, but this opinion of the ancients was not wholly a fallacy, since a portion of nectar is taken with the insects, and supplies to the Humming-bird that kind of nourishment which the larger insectivorous birds derive from fruit. When eleven days old, these tiny creatures, in their beautiful robes of green, quit the nest, but necessarily remain under parental control a week longer, before they are able to support themselves. By some inexplicable circumstance, the young do not leave for their winter-homes until some time after their parents have departed.
The eggs are beautifully elliptical in outline, and of a pure dull white color. They measure .50 by .34 of an inch. Never more than a single brood is raised annually. Nests with eggs have been taken as late as the 20th of July, but these were doubtless laid by females whose early efforts had been interfered with.
Original Size
Plate VIII.—PIPILO ERYTHROPHTIIALMUS, Vieillot.—Towhee Bunting.
The Towhee Bunting, or Ciieavink, has an extended distribution throughout the eastern portions of the United States, ranging from Florida and Georgia on the south-east to the Selkirk settlements on the northwest, and westward to the border of the Great Plains, where it is replaced by closely allied races. It breeds wherever found, certainly in Georgia, and, doubtless, in Florida, although sparingly.
According to Wilson, it is found in the middle districts of Virginia, and thence south to Florida, during the months of January, February and March; but as the weather grows mild, and Nature begins to don her livery of green, many forsake these haunts, and wing their flight to distant localities; reaching the Middle Atlantic States about the fifteenth of April, Massachusetts and Connecticut towards the last of the month, Maine and New Hampshire early in May, and the North-western States a little later.
In some regions the birds arrive singly, but retire in small flocks. This is the case in the vicinity of Washington; whereas in Eastern Pennsylvania, they are somewhat gregarious for a week or ten days after their arrival, when they separate, and lead solitary lives. Their sole object now is the acquirement of food. For this purpose they repair to waste fields and damp thickets, or to small patches of underbrush along frequented roads. Here their simple song may be heard during the intervals of feeding, with scarce an intermission, from five o'clock in the morning until eight in the evening, by the early or belated pedestrian. In rain or in sunshine, or at noonday in the hottest weather of the season, the woods resound therewith, or with that peculiar note of complaint from which the species has received the name Chewink.
There is an expression of cheerfulness in these notes, though they are not delivered with that enthusiasm which characterizes the songs of many of our species. But music, like poetry, must be of a somewhat plaintive nature, if it would take firm hold of the feelings.
After a period of three or four weeks mostly spent in feeding, the males seem to tire of such a life, and seek to attract the attention of the females. Perched on the lower branch of a tree, near the edge of a wood, or 011 the summit of a small tree or tall bush in the midst of a thicket, or hid from view by clusters of bushes, they may be heard pouring forth, with all the fervor of their being, their strange madrigals. At first, their efforts to captivate are unheeded. But patiently and persistently the singing is kept up in a quiet, simple manner, until their auditors become impressed, and modestly quit their shady retreats to encourage the musicians by their presence. Having gained this advantage, they follow it up, and in less than a week from the time the first note was uttered, have mastered the situation. The females wholly entranced, yield to the persuasions of their would-be lords, and conjugal relations are entered into. This generally occurs not later than the fifteenth of May. But the happy couple are not yet ready to begin nest-building. They must needs celebrate the occasion of their marriage. Accordingly, they set out on a wedding-trip, so to speak, visiting adjoining lots and thickets, and enjoying the delights and scenes around them. This continues for four or five days, when the lovers, thoroughly surfeited, return and quietly settle down to prosy life.
The erection of a home is now the absorbing topic of interest and conversation. Where to build, and how, are matters that are agitating their minds, and which seem, judging from the actions of the parties interested, very difficult questions to adjust. After no inconsiderable portion of time thus spent, and with little possibility of coming to any decision, a separation ensues, and the country scoured for miles around.
Should a situation which seems eligible be discovered by either party, the other, by a peculiar signal, is called to the spot, and the advantages thereof carefully discussed. If satisfactory, it is accepted, and building operations commenced. Otherwise, the search is commenced anew, and continued until one is obtained which is mutually pleasing. But where the birds are unmolested, the same localities are probably selected on each return of the breeding-season. The situation generally chosen is a small thicket with a dense growth of underbrush, or a high piece of ground overrun by brambles, and dotted by patches of fern. Latterly, nests have been frequently found in clumps of tall grass, in fields once swampy in character.
In New England, the locality usually chosen is a low, dense woods, thickets of briers and bushes near streams of water, or the "scrub," which is a low or bushy "growth" of trees, chiefly of oaks and birches, occurring in dry, hilly lands once occupied by pines. In the extreme northern limits of its range, dry uplands, near the edges of woods, or high tracts covered with a. low brushwood, are used, rather than low or moist grounds, as was the case in some sections at the time when Wilson wrote. The love for such situations doubtless gave rise to the appellation of "Swamp Robin," which is generally applied to this species in Pennsylvania.
When placed within a thicket, or in the borders thereof, the nest is either built in a depression of the ground, usually beneath a bunch of grass, in a pile of old brush or fagots, or on a slight prominence surrounded by tall, graceful ferns. Within a concavity, the structure is made to project slightly above the margin thereof, and is artfully concealed from the gaze of intruders by dry leaves. So completely is it hidden, that all efforts to find it frequently prove unavailing.
The work of building is entered into with diligence and alacrity, each bird collecting and adjusting the materials as it thinks best. While thus engaged—which is usually from sunrise to sunset, allowing the necessary time for foraging and rest—the architects seldom, if ever, get at outs, but labor with a purpose, and in the best of spirits. The time thus spent has never been known to exceed three days.
So little variation is manifested in these structures, that specimens from the Southern States resemble those from the Eastern, Middle and Western sections so closely, as to be readily identified by persons of the least experience in such matters.
A typical nest is mainly composed of the leaves of deciduous trees, twigs, grass and roots, 011 the outside, and is lined with the inner fibres of the wild grape-vine, or with fine stems of grasses. The drawing represents it as being constituted of the stems of grasses, with a slight intermixture of leaves and roots, and as having a lining of reddish-brown stems of the same. It measures