Long-billed Marsh Wren
Short-billed Marsh Wren
LONG-BILLED MARSH WREN
Telmatodytes palustris palustris (Wilson)
Description.—Crown brown, bordered on sides with black; white line over eye; middle of back black streaked with white, rest of back brown; wings and tail barred with black; underparts white; sides reddish brown. Length: About 5 inches.
Range in Pennsylvania.—A migrant and summer resident in suitably marshy situations from latter April to early October. It is very local in occurrence.
Nest.—A globular, strongly built structure of grasses and cat-tail leaves, made while the materials are damp, and placed among weeds or rushes a few feet from ground or water; the entrance is on the side. Eggs: 5 to 9, dark brown, or light brown, heavily and finely spotted with darker brown.
To find these wrens, wade out into the very heart of the marsh. Here the clackety songs of the nervous creatures announce to us that we are near the nest. We find three or four of these, but discover no eggs. Patient hunting finally reveals a set of eggs after we have located perhaps a dozen “dummy” nests.
BROWN CREEPER
Certhia familiaris americana Bonaparte
Description.—Climbs a tree-trunk like a woodpecker; smaller than an English Sparrow; bill curved like a wren’s. Plumage brown above, considerably streaked and otherwise marked with white, grayish, and darker brown; underparts grayish white; tail-feathers pointed and somewhat barred. Length: 4½ inches.
Range in Pennsylvania.—A common migrant in March and April and in September and October; occasional, sometimes common, in winter; a summer resident only at high altitudes or in northern counties.
Nest.—Of bark-strips, fibers, plant-down, and the like, placed under loose or curled bark, at from 6 to 20 feet from the ground, usually in a dense, low, woodland or wooded swamp. Eggs: 4 to 7, white, spotted with brown.
The Brown Creeper’s fine, lisping call is not always heard, even by the keenest ear. Its song is a delicate, warbler-like bit which I have syllabized as dee-dee, diddily, de-dwee. This bird begins his trunk-searching at the base of the tree; he ascends spirally, searching carefully as he jerks along and when he gets to the upper branches, he dives to the base of the next tree, to begin his ascent again.
Brown Creeper