The less than 5 percent of vegetable food “consists of a few seeds and leaf galls.”
Gordon W. Gullion tells me that in Eugene, Oreg., from early January until the first of April 1948, Townsend’s warblers were observed at a feeding station almost daily, eating cheese, marshmallows, and peanut butter.
Behavior.—A marked characteristic of Townsend’s warblers is their fondness for the tree tops, especially on their breeding grounds and to some extent at other seasons. In the coniferous forests which they frequent in summer, they confine their activities almost entirely to the tops of the tallest fir trees, where they travel rapidly, stopping only long enough to glean their food and then hastening onward, returning, perhaps, over the same trees in their active restless foraging.
Later in the summer and as migration time draws near, they are frequently seen at lower levels, among deciduous trees and in second growth woods, often in association with kinglets, chickadees, other warblers, and juncos.
Voice.—Mrs. Allen (MS.) renders the song as a “weazy weazy weazy weazy tweea, rising in spirals, and the call-note a soft chip, not so metallic as the lutescent’s, and less emphatic than the Audubon’s.” According to Rathbun (MS.), “its song is heard during May and June quite persistently under all climatic conditions.” Dr. Merrill (1898) says that the song, as he heard it in Idaho, “usually consists of five notes, deé deé deé—dĕ dĕ, all, especially the first three, uttered in the peculiar harsh drawl of D. virens. Later in the season this song changes somewhat.” This second song was heard in low second growth. Mr. Rathbun also refers in his notes to a different song, heard in some young second growth; the bird was “singing softly as if to itself, this being a much more finished performance than the ordinary song, although identical in construction, the distinction being an elaboration of the song in full in softer tones.” Ralph Hoffmann (1927) found the song of Townsend’s warbler difficult to distinguish from that of the black-throated gray warbler. “The Townsend Warbler’s song has less of the drawling inflection in the opening notes than the Black-throated Gray’s and often ends with a prolonged ee-zee. A song noted by the writer in the Olympics in western Washington was transcribed as a hoarse swee swee swee zee.”
Field marks.—The adult male Townsend’s warbler is distinctively marked, having the crown, cheeks, and throat black, with bright yellow spaces between these areas, and an olive-green back and bright yellow breast, both streaked with black; it has two prominent white wing bars and considerable white on the outer tail feathers. The female has a similar pattern, but the colors are much duller and she has no black throat. Young and adults in the fall are much like the adult female in spring, but are more or less clouded with brownish. There is no other western warbler that is much like it.
Fall.—Theed Pearse tells me that he has seen Townsend’s warblers on migration through Vancouver Island, British Columbia, as early as August 13 and as late as October 9, but gives no winter records. Rathburn gives me two winter records for the vicinity of Seattle, Wash.; D. E. Brown took two males on January 9, 1921, and saw “a number of others”; and a week later he collected a female. These were doubtless, winter casuals, as the summer residents and transients pass through Oregon in October or earlier.
Mrs. Allen writes to me from Berkeley, Calif.: “The Townsend Warbler is an abundant fall and spring migrant and a common winter visitant. In Berkeley the average date of arrival in the fall is September 28 (18 records), the earliest August 27, 1931. They are most abundant during October, after which they are reduced to winter numbers.”
Henshaw (1875) writes: