In Pennsylvania, Wilson states that the Wood Pewee is the latest of the summer birds in arriving, seldom coming before the 12th or 15th of May. He found it frequenting the shady high-timbered woods, where there is little underwood and an abundance of dead twigs and branches. It was generally found in low situations. He adds that it builds its nest on the upper side of a limb or branch, formed outwardly of moss and lined with various soft materials, and states that the female lays five white eggs, and that the brood leave the nest about the middle of June. Probably the last statement is correct as applied to Pennsylvania, but the intimation as to the color of the egg and some of the characteristics of the nest is so inaccurate as to make it doubtful whether Wilson could have ever seen the nest for himself.
This species, like all its family, is a very expert catcher of insects, even the most minute, and has a wonderfully quick perception of their near presence, even when the light of day has nearly gone and in the deep gloom of thick woods. It takes its station on 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 peculiar 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. During this watch it occasionally is heard to utter a low twitter, with a quivering movement of the wings and tail, and more rarely to enunciate a louder but still feeble call-note, sounding
like pēē-ē. These notes are continued until dark, and are also uttered throughout the season.
Mr. Nuttall states that this species at times displays a tyrannical disposition, and that it has been observed to chase a harmless Sparrow to the ground, because it happened to approach his station for collecting insects.
According to Mr. 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. It always chooses one that is covered with small lichens, and saddles its nest upon its upper surface, so closely assimilated by its own external coating of lichens as not to be distinguishable from a natural protuberance on the limb. This structure is extremely beautiful, rivalling even the artistic nests of the Humming-Bird. It is cup-shaped, and a perfect segment of a sphere in shape. The periphery of the nest is made of fine root fibres, small lichens, and bits of cobwebs and other similar materials. The outer sides are entirely covered with a beautiful coating of mosses and lichens, glued to the materials with the saliva of the builder. The eggs are usually four in number, measure .78 of an inch in length and .55 in breadth. They are obtuse at one end and tapering at the other, have a ground of a rich cream-color, and are marked about the larger end with a wreath of blended purple, lilac, and red-brown in large and confluent spots. They hatch about the middle of June, leave the nest in July, and have but a single brood.
A nest of this species, taken in Lynn by Mr. Welch, and built on the dead branch of a forest tree, has a diameter of three and a height of one and a half inches. The cavity has a depth of one inch, and a diameter, at the rim, of two and a half inches. The base is flattened by its position. Its walls are strongly woven of fine dry stems, intermingled with vegetable down, covered externally with lichens, cemented to the exterior, apparently by the secretions of the bird. The base is thinner, and made of softer materials.
During the winter months this species is present as a migrant in various parts of Mexico, south to Guatemala.
Contopus virens, var. richardsoni, Baird.
SHORT-LEGGED PEWEE; WESTERN WOOD PEWEE.