Wood pewee

“ The pewees, as a class, are the best architects we have. The kingbird builds a nest altogether admirable, using various soft cotton and woolen substances, and sparing neither time nor material to make it substantial and warm. The green-crested pewee builds its nest in many instances wholly of the blossoms of the white oak. The wood pewee builds a neat, compact, socket-shaped nest of moss and lichens on a horizontal branch. ”

“ They do not scour the limbs and trees like the warblers, but, perched upon the middle branches, wait, like true hunters, for the game to come along. There is often a very audible snap of the beak as they seize their prey.
The wood pewee, the prevailing species in this locality, arrests your attention by his sweet, pathetic cry. There is room for it also in the deep woods, as well as for the more prolonged and elevated strains.
Its relative, the phoebe-bird, builds an exquisite nest of moss on the side of some shelving cliff or overhanging rock. ”

“ The wood pewee is also a gloomy soul, possessing no gift of color or song to attract the eye or hold the fancy; his long drawn out monotonous note always reminds me of hot August afternoons when all other 187 bird voices are silent as the grave and summer reigns with undisputed sway. The prince of woodland flycatchers, both from point of coloring and attractive personality, is the great crested ”

“ As the whip-poor-will loves the darkness and the tanager the bright sun of the topmost boughs of the grove, so the wood pewee loves the resinous depths of the pines, where in the hot twilight of a sum{266}mer midday he pipes his cheerful little three-note song. Like the cicada, he seems to sing best when it is hottest, and the thought of his song inevitably brings to mind the drone of the summer-loving insect, the prattle of the brook at the foot of the hill, and the lazy dappling of the sunlight as it falls perpendicularly to the feathery fronds of the cinnamon ferns far below. ”

“ While watching it occasionally twitters, with a quivering movement of the head and tail, uttering a feeble call-note, sounding like pee-e.
The nest of the Wood Pewee, which is always “saddled” and securely attached to a rather stout branch, usually lichen-covered, is said to be one of the most elegant examples of bird architecture. From beneath it so much resembles a natural portion of the limb, but for its betrayal by the owner, it would seldom be discovered. ”

“ The wood pewee, like the olive-sided flycatcher, has wings decidedly longer than its tail, and it is by no means a simple matter for the novice to tell these birds apart or separate them distinctly in the mind from the other members of a family whose coloring and habits are most confusingly similar. This dusky haunter of tall shady trees has not yet learned to be sociable like the phœbe; but while it may not be so much in evidence close to our homes, it is doubtless just as common. The orchard is as near the house as it often cares to come. ”

“ The wood pewee builds of moss and fine fiber, grass and rootlets, using the lichen covering for the outside, as does the humming bird. It is a beautiful nest, a rustic home which perfectly fits the dead pine limb on which you often find it, and its surroundings, a nest as rustic as the grove and the bird. ”

“ That dead limb was the perch of a wood pewee, a silent grave bird [162] with a sad call, who flew on when he was still only a lonely stranger. That oak top was made memorable by the sight of a flaming oriole, though he came on a cold foggy morning and answered my calls with a broken song and a half-hearted scold as he sat with his feathers ruffled up about him. ”

“ The nest seems to grow out of the branch on which it is placed.
Range: North and South America. Breeds from southern Canada to southern Texas and central Florida, westward to eastern Nebraska; winters from Nicaraugua to Colombia and Peru.
Of all the flycatchers of my acquaintance the Wood Pewee is the most lovable. He is the only one that possesses a sweet voice; but his note, long-drawn and sad, seems to proceed from an over-burdened heart. The appearance of the little bird is dejected, as with drooping tail, he utters the plaintive sound. ”

“ The Wood Pewee, like all of its family, is an expert catcher of insects, even the most minute, and has a remarkably quick perception of their near presence, even when the light of day has nearly gone and in the deep gloom of the thick woods. Dr. Brewer describes it as taking its station at the end of a low dead limb, from which it darts out in quest of insects, sometimes for a single individual, which it seizes with a sharp snap of its bill; and, frequently meeting insect after insect, it keeps up a constant snapping sound as it passes on, and finally returns to its post to resume its watch. ”

“ Audubon, some of these birds spend the winter months in the extreme Southern States, Louisiana and Florida, where they feed upon berries as well as insects.
In Massachusetts the Wood Pewee is a very abundant species, and may usually be found in any open woods, or in an orchard of large spreading trees. In the latter situation it frequently breeds. It usually selects a lower dead limb of a tree, from ten to thirty feet from the ground, and occasionally, but more seldom, a living moss-grown branch. ”

“ TRAILL’S FLYCATCHER.
(Empidonax pusillus Trailli.)
In size and general appearance, this species closely resembles the wood pewee; but its habitat and mode of nesting are much different. It does not frequent the back-woods nor the high timbered places; and not until a thick second-growth of low underwood succeeds the original forest in low swampy places does it make its appearance in the central districts of Ontario. ”

“ It is never saddled on a limb like that of a Wood Pewee, neither is it pensile like those of the Vireos, but is built in the fork of a small limb, and securely fastened thereto by a strip of bark. The nest itself is mostly made of fine strips of bark or weed-stalks, woven together without much care as to neatness or strength, and so very slight is the structure that you may often count the eggs in the nest from below. Occasionally this bird constructs its nest of the blossoms of the hickory-tree, and when thus made is very neat and pretty. ”

“ The shallowness of the wood pewee's saucer-shaped nest, its position upon the branch, and especially its external dress of lichens, [90] all conspire to render it inconspicuous. It is an interesting question whether the owner herself appreciates this, or has merely inherited the fashion, without thought of the reasons for it. The latter supposition, I reluctantly confess, looks to me the more probable. It must often be true of other animals, as it is of men, that they build better than they know. ”

“ There he will stand on a fence or low branch and sing or call by the hour, every few minutes flying out to catch a passing insect.
This bird is in dark colors, with whitish breast and two white wing-bars. His common call is a [141] plaintive, long-drawn-out "pee-u-ee" and sometimes "pee-ay," but he can sing a droll little song. One lady who watched a wood pewee build her nest heard her sing to herself as she worked what sounded like "O-wee-wee-wee."
The nest made by this little mother is very pretty. It is most often on a dead limb where a branch starts out, making a broad foundation. ”

“ None remain to breed.
102. Sayornis sayus Brd. Say’s Pewee.—This Pewee I have observed only in April, on the borders of thickets and in the shrubbery near woods, and always singly.
103. Contopus virens Cab. Wood Pewee.—Common summer sojourner in open woods, particularly in the “post oak,” where its loud characteristic notes can be heard throughout the summer. Although this bird is common, I did not succeed in finding a nest. Arrives early in April; departs early in October.
104. Empidonax acadicus Bd. ”

“ Paddling near the shore, we frequently heard the pe-pe of the olive-sided flycatcher, also the wood pewee, and the kingfisher, thus early in the morning. The Indian reminding us that he could not work without eating, we stopped to breakfast on the main shore, southwest of Deer Island, at a spot where the Mimulus ringens grew abundantly. We took out our bags, and the Indian made a fire under a very large bleached log, using white pine bark from a stump, though he said that hemlock was better, and kindling with canoe birch bark. ”

“ The vision of the distant hills is blurred by heat pulsations; the song of birds has ceased and the very caddis-flies are taking refuge from the glare. The sun is dominant and all Nature yields drowsy allegiance to his sway. All but Pewee. He avoids the sun, indeed, but from a sheltered perch he lifts a voice of protest, “Dear Me!”
It seems uncalled-for. The bird does not appear to be unhappy. Flycatching is good, and the Pewee cocks his head quite cheerfully as he returns to his perch after a successful foray. ”

“ Once, the children of a man employed about the place oölogized the nest, and the pewees left us for a year or two. I felt towards those boys as the messmates of the Ancient Mariner did towards him after he had shot the albatross. But the pewees came back at last, and one of them is now on his wonted perch, so near my window that I can hear the click of his bill as he snaps a fly on the wing.... The pewee is the first bird to pipe up in the morning; and, during the early summer he preludes his matutinal ejaculation of pewee with a slender whistle, unheard at any other time. ”

“ It is found wherever there is timber, but is partial to half-open situations, and is much more in evidence East than West. It is especially fond of pine groves and rough brushy hillsides near water. Cannon Hill, in [385] Spokane, is a typical resort and a mere tyro can see three or four nests there on a June day.
The Pewee takes the public quite into her confidence in nest building. Not only does she build in the open, without a vestige of leafy cover, but when she is fully freighted with nesting material, she flies straight to the nest and proceeds to arrange it with perfect nonchalance. ”

“ Western Pewee—Uncommon to rare summer resident of wooded bottomlands along the Little Missouri River. Look for it in both units of the Roosevelt Memorial, at Sully’s Creek Park, and in wooded residential areas of Medora and Marmarth. This species has a harsh call which is quite different from the “pee-a-wee” of the Eastern Pewee. It can often be separated by sight as well. The Western has a dusky breast and flanks with a light “zipper” extending upward to the upper breast something like an Olive-sided Flycatcher. ”

“ Peggy’s hoofs are swift, going home, and the road, although the same, seems twice as short as before. At one point we vary it, cutting across country through a wood of pines. Beneath the pines the earth is all brown unflecked by any sun, and the light is clear amber, except that at the far edge of the grove there are bright gold gleams through the distant tree stems. Above our heads the color is not brown; it is that strange deep gray-blue that makes mysterious the heart of a pine tree where the branches meet the trunk. ”

“ The bird keeps her place till you are within a few feet of her, when she flits to a near branch, and, with many oscillations of her tail, observes you anxiously. Since the country has become settled, this pewee has fallen into the strange practice of occasionally placing its nest under a bridge, hay-shed, or other artificial structure, where it is subject to all kinds of interruptions and annoyances. ”

“ Along with these two fireweeds, breeders of sylphs, in my pine wood grows the pokeweed, a villainous name for a wonderfully vigorous and beautiful plant. Just now its close-set racemes of purple-black berries are ripening, their color a vivid contrast with the smooth rich green of its ovate-oblong leaves and the wine color of its stems. It is really a royal plant, and so great is its vigor that its dark berries threaten to burst their skins and scatter their rich crimson lifeblood. ”

“ Let no one imagine that the shortening in of shoots recommended consists of cutting the young sprays evenly all round the trees as one would shear a hedge. It more nearly resembles the pruning of the vine; for the peach, like the vine, bears its fruit only on the young wood of the previous summer's growth. The aim should be to have this young bearing wood distributed evenly over the tree, as should be true of a grape-vine. When the trees are kept low, as dwarf standards, the fruit is more within reach, and less liable to be blown off by high winds. ”

“ Is it not sad to know that the brave, bold dogwood, holding out its spring flag of truce [Pg 200] from arduous weather, and its autumn store of sustenance for our feathered friends, is in danger of extinction from the forest because its hardy, smooth, even-grained white wood has been found to be especially available in the "arts"? I feel like begging for the life of every dogwood, as too beautiful to be destroyed for any mere utility. ”

“ The pewee will sit almost motionless on a twig, lisping his plaintive tune at intervals, until a luckless insect comes buzzing near, all unconscious of its peril, when the bird will make a quick dash at it, seize it dexterously between his mandibles, and then circle around gracefully to the same or another perch, having made a splendid “catch on the fly.” If the quarry he has taken is small, it slips at once down his throat ”

“ Though a shy and retiring bird, the Pewee is known to almost every person, on account of its remarkable note. Like the swallow, he builds his nest under a sheltering roof or rock, and it is often fixed upon a beam or plank under a bridge that crosses a small stream. ”