Vireo

“ The Red-eyed Vireo is found alike in the shade trees of lawns, in orchards or woodlands, and is especially fond of sycamore groves along streams. The male is a tireless songster, and even at noon-tide of a sultry summer-day, when all other warblers are silent, his monotonous song will be heard. ”

“ This is undoubtedly the beauty of the vireo family — a group of neat, active, stoutly built, and vigorous little birds of yellow, greenish, and white plumage; birds that love the trees, and whose feathers reflect the coloring of the leaves they hide, hunt, and nest among. "We have no birds," says Bradford Torrey, "so unsparing of their music: they sing from morning till night." ”

“ Red-eyed Vireo had flown away for a little time, out she crept, inspected their nest, and, finding it to her taste, entered and deposited her egg. She felt sure, you see, that Mrs. Vireo had a kind heart and would hatch out the foundling with her own."
"And she did," sadly said Mr. Vireo, "she did."
"The company the tribe keeps is no better than themselves," said Mr. Wood Thrush. "During the breeding-season you will see the grackles, and red-winged blackbirds, and the cowbirds chattering and gossipping together, as they roost for the night. They are a lawless crew. ”

“ It was the staccato whistle of an olive-backed thrush, a sweet familiarity, over which I should have supposed it impossible for either of us to be puzzled.
The star of the flock, as some readers will not need to be told, having marked the unexpected name in the foregoing list, was the Philadelphia vireo. What a bright minute it is in a man’s vacation when such a stranger suddenly hops upon a branch before his eyes! ”

“ The yellow-throated vireo partakes of all the family characteristics, but, in addition to these, it eclipses all its relatives in the brilliancy of its coloring and in the art of nest-building, which it has brought to a state of hopeless perfection. No envious bird need try to excel the exquisite finish of its workmanship. Happily, it has wit enough to build its pensile nest high above the reach of small boys, usually suspending it from a branch overhanging running water that threatens too precipitous a bath to tempt the young climbers. ”

“ More common in my region than the jay or the cardinal is the red-eyed vireo. This creature moves industriously in and out among the leaves of our trees. It is persistently in motion, is nearly constant in song, and is a bird of fair size, being larger than our English sparrow, though smaller than a robin. Many a nature lover will recognize twenty-five or thirty birds at sight without any difficulty, and not know the vireo. Yet the vireo is more common than two-thirds of the birds he knows. ”

“ The warbling vireo is admirably named; there is no one of our birds that can more properly be said to warble. He keeps further from the ground than the others, and shows a strong preference for the elms of village streets, out of which his delicious music drops upon the ears of all passers underneath. How many of them hear it and thank the singer is unhappily another question.
The solitary vireo may once in a while be heard in a roadside tree, chanting as familiarly as any red-eye ”

“ The solitary vireo is heard only in the deep woods, while the white-eyed is still more local or restricted in its range, being found only in wet, bushy places, whence its vehement, varied, and brilliant song is sure to catch the dullest ear. ”

“ Because I turned from all this sunset glory to find out what little bird was making the very big fuss near by, and because, parting the foliage of an arrow-wood bush, I looked with exquisite pleasure into the nest of a white-eyed vireo, does it mean that I am still unborn as to soul? For some reason it was a relief to look away from that west of vast and burning color to the delicately dotted eggs in the tiny cradle—the same relief felt in descending from a mountain-top to the valley ”

“ Two birds I have seen, which allowed themselves to be stroked in the freest manner, while sitting on the eggs, and which ate from my hand as readily as any pet canary."
The solitary vireo also builds a pensile nest, swung from the crotch of a branch, not so high from the ground as the yellow-throated vireos nor so exquisitely finished, but still a beautiful little structure of pine-needles, plant-fibre, dry leaves, and twigs, all lichen-lined and bound and rebound with coarse spiders' webs. ”

“ The red-eyed vireo (Vireosylva olivacea) loves solitude. During the nesting season it seeks some dense thicket, selects a fork on a drooping limb, and constructs its wonderful basket-shaped, pensile nest. Intertwining about the fork a silky material for the basis of the structure, they put together with grasses, lichens, and plant fibres a wonderful little home for their progeny. When working away at building they are very cheerful, [Pg 260] almost continually singing a sweet, pleasant warble, as though haranguing the dwellers of the silent places, hence their pseudonym, “preacher.” ”

“ The White-Eyed Vireo differs from his red-eyed cousin in being slightly smaller, in having a small patch of yellow around the eye, a white iris, and two wing-bars. His head is greener and his breast and sides are tinged with yellow.
He lives in thickets. He possesses in a marked degree the vireo habit of scolding. He has more power as a songster than his better-known relatives. ”

“ By no means the recluse that its name would imply, the solitary vireo, while a bird of the woods, shows a charming curiosity about the stranger with opera-glasses in hand, who has penetrated to the deep, swampy tangles, where it chooses to live. Peering at you through the green undergrowth with an eye that seems especially conspicuous because of its encircling white rim, it is at least as sociable and cheerful as any member of its family, and Mr. Bradford Torrey credits it with "winning tameness." ”

“ The White-eyed Vireo may usually be found in wild, swampy, open grounds, near the edges of woods, and where there are small thickets of smilax and other briers and wild vines, in the midst of which it often builds its pensile nest. These nests are rarely, if ever, more than three or four feet from the ground. Two nests of this bird, one from Neosho Falls, Kansas, [Pg 387] the other from Lynn, Mass., may be taken as characteristic of the species. They are almost exactly hemispherical in shape, their height and diameter being the same,—three inches. ”

“ The common Red-eyed Vireo is an abundant species throughout Eastern North America, from Florida to Nova Scotia on the northeast, to Lake Winnepeg on the northwest, and as far west as the Rocky Mountains. It apparently breeds wherever found, and in especial abundance in the Central States. It is a familiar and fearless species, often found, like the Warbling Vireo, in the very midst of crowded cities, and making its lively and pleasant notes heard in their public squares and private gardens, amid the ruder sounds of the neighboring streets. ”

“ The Blue-headed Vireo, or its varieties, of which there are several, frequent nearly the whole of North America. The typical form of the species, that of our illustration, has a range covering Eastern North America and extending westward to the great plains. It breeds from Southern New England and the lake states northward to Hudson Bay and southward in the higher altitudes of the Alleghenies. It passes the winter in Cuba, Mexico and Central America. The Blue-headed Vireo is frequently called the Solitary Vireo, or Greenlet, because of its retiring habits. ”

“ It is a very stoic among birds, and seems never surprised at anything, “even at the loud report of a gun, with the shot rattling about it in the branches, and, if uninjured, it will stand for a moment unconcerned, or move along, peering on every side amongst the foliage, warbling its tender, liquid strains.”
The nest of this species is like that of the Red-eyed Vireo—a strong, durable, basket-like fabric, made of bark strips, lined with fine grasses. It is suspended by the brim in slender, horizontal forks of branches, at a great height from the ground. ”

“ I ought, perhaps, to premise that the solitary vireo (called also the blue-headed vireo and the blue-headed greenlet) is strictly a bird of the woods. It belongs to a distinctively American family, and is one of five species which are more or less abundant as summer residents in Eastern Massachusetts, being itself in most places the least numerous of the five, and, with the possible exception of the white-eye, the most retiring. ”

“ I had stopped, as I always do in passing, to look down into a certain dense thicket of shrubbery, through which a brook runs, a favorite resort for birds of many kinds. At first the place seemed to be empty, but in answer to some curiosity-provoking noises on my part a water thrush started up to balance himself on a branch directly under my nose, and the next moment a vireo hopped into full sight just beyond him; a vireo with plain back and wings, with no dark lines bordering the crown, and having the under parts of a bright yellow. ”

“ I know boys who can name a flock of ducks when they are mere specks twinkling in their rapid rush across the autumn sky; and girls who instantly recognise a goldfinch by its waving flight above the garden. The white band across the end of the kingbird's tail leads to his identification the minute some sharp young eyes perceive it. At a considerable distance, a little girl I know distinguished a white-eyed from a red-eyed vireo, not by the colour of the iris of either bird's eye, but by the yellowish white bars on the white-eyed vireo's wings which she had noticed at a glance. ”

“ A handsome Vireo found in localities such as are frequented by the Red-eyed species. Nowhere do they appear to be as abundant as that species, however; they are more abundant than many suppose, but the difficulty of clearly seeing the yellow breast when they are feeding in the tree tops, combined with the similarity of their songs, usually caused them to be passed by without inspection. ”

“ The eggs of this Vireo vary greatly in size, according to the locality; the farther south the smaller they are found. One, marked on the shell East Tennessee, June 1, 1858, Alex. Gerhardt, measures .78 by .52 of an inch, while one from Halifax, Nova Scotia, measures .95 by .65. The ground-color of all is a clear crystal-white, and they are marked chiefly at the larger end with spots and finer dots of red-brown.
Mr. Robert Kennicott, in his notes, speaks of finding a nest of the Red-eyed Vireo at the Cumberland House, Saskatchewan, June 28. ”

“ The notes of this species may be heard from the last of May until late in September, and in the long summer evenings are often continued until after it is quite dark. Their song has all the beauty and pathos of the Warbling Vireo, and greatly resembles it, but is more powerful and full in tone. It is a very interesting sight to watch one of these little performers in the midst of his song. He appears perfectly absorbed in his work, his form dilates, his crest is erected, his throat expands, and he seems to be utterly unconscious of all around him. ”

“ Possibly there are circumstances in the life of a redeyed vireo which, if known, would account for his irritability and egotistical belief that all eyes are upon him with evil intent; but our eyes are dull, and one could wish at times that his trials, whatever they may be, might sweeten his temper. I do know, at least, that redeyed vireos are much tormented by that plague of bird life, the cowbunting, which delights in laying her eggs in the redeye’s nest ”

“ Solitary Vireo.—Rare during migrations.
52. Vireo noveboracensis, Bon. White-eyed Vireo. A common summer resident in localities where Viburnum dentatum, V. molle, V. pruneifolium, Rhamnus carolinensis, Cornus florida, laurel-oaks (Quercus imbricaria) , and elms are growing, especially on the borders of woods, in open thickets, peach gardens, etc.
53. Vireo belli, Aud. Bell’s Vireo.—A common summer sojourner. A not quite finished nest was discovered April 15 on a horizontal branch of a Viburnum dentatum on the edge of a thicket, about five feet above the ground. It contained three fresh eggs. ”

“ Their nests are not easy to find, although they do not always make a great deal of effort at concealment. Like all the vireo tribe, they suspend their tiny baskets from the fork or crotch of a horizontal twig. The nest is somewhat bulkier than the compact little cup of the red-eyed vireo, and is apt to be more carefully concealed in the foliage, although I have found more than one nest that was hung in plain sight. I remember one in particular. It was dangling from the outer twigs of a small bush by the side of the woodland path which I was pursuing. ”

“ Lawrence (1953:53) , tells of a male Red-eyed Vireo singling out a female from a flock of migrants passing through his territory and violently driving her to the ground. Shortly after this attack the pair was seen searching for a nest site. But such an incident has not been reported for other vireos, nor have I witnessed such behavior myself.
Early courtship activities of the Bell Vireo are characteristically violent affairs, with the male directing strong aggressive attacks toward the female. Rapid, looping flights through the thickets occur, the female leading the male. ”

“ In certain portions of the country this species is evidently on the increase, becoming more and more common as the country is settled, and towns and villages spring up.
The Warbling Vireo builds its nest usually in more elevated positions than any others of this family. For the most part in the vicinity of dwellings, often over frequented streets, they suspend their elaborately woven and beautiful little basket-like nest, secure from intrusion from their human neighbors, and protected by the near presence of man from all their more dreaded enemies. ”