Evening star., 1945-05-25
This and That
By Charles E. Trdce1UeH.

Dear Sir:
Il saw bird in my yard the other
day that I did not know 1t seemed to be
more streamlined than the wood thrush
and yet CHESTER, If make myself plain
The breast was spotted heavier than
the wood thrush, and the spots went far
back on the stomach. The back struck
me as different shade of brown, prob
ably with more olive in it.
The bird was just about the same size
as the wood thrush. 1t undoubtedly was
thrush of some sort. 1 have many
wood thrushes in the garden all summer
and know them intimately.
There were two of these birds. When
I first saw them, they flew up into
maple together and sat together; later
saw them together in the grass, not more
than feet apart.
Il have never seen pair Of wood
thrushes together so faithfully. If you
can identify these birds for me will ap-
preciate it very much. The feathers
looked rather rough. If it had not been
too soon for baby wood thrushes, I might
have thought that was what they were
Sincerely. M. J. D."
4
These birds probably were the gray
checked thrush.
There are seven thrushes which come
here, eight if you count the robin, and
nine if you take in the bluebird These,
of course, are really thrushes, although
we never stop to think of them as such,
in the ordinary course of events. Cur
robin is our robin and our bluebird is our
biuebird. Time and custom have seen
to that
The gray-cheeked thrush is 734 inches
long, which also is the official size Of the
wood thrush.
The gray-cheeked is fairly common
in migration, being seen here usually
from May 10 to 26 and in the fall be-
tween September 81 and October T.
1t is very difficult to tell it from Bick-
nell's thrush. Probably most of the lat
ter are put down as the gray-cheeked
thrush.
The scientific name of the gray
checked thrush is Hylocichla minima
aliciae.
The "aliciae" means Alice" and stands
for member of the family of the man,
one Baird, who gave the bird its scien-
tific name.
Hence this thrush sometimes is known
as Alice's thrush, certainly very pretty
name.
1t is one of the birds which sings in
fight. Others are the bobolink, the yell
loW-breasted chat and the ovenbird.
Bicknells thrush, previously men,
toned, is slightly smaller than the gray
checked. It is more common in the
Catskills.
The gray-cheeked thrush comes all the
way from Peru to visit us and then goes
on to Alaska. The nest is in low tree,
and now and then even on the ground:
1t is large, woven of grasses and lined
with finer ones. Some dried moss also is
used. Usually four eggs are laid. These
are green-blue, speckled with rusty spots.
The back of this bird is grayish- -olive,
as our correspondent discovered. The
heavy spots 60 much farther back on
the underside of the gray checked thrush
than do the spots of the wood thrush,
whose color on the back is much redder.
Thrushes which come here are the
wood thrush, the veery (Wilson's thrush)
the willow thrush, the checked
thrush, Bicknells thrush, olive-backed
thrush, the hermit thrush, the robin and
the bluebird.
The hermit thrush is seen here only in
deep woods, such as are found in Rock
Creek Park. A few of them spent the
winter there.
The wood thrush remains the most
abundant and popular hereabouts No
one who has watched this bird and
listened to its beautiful song will ever
cease to wonder over and be happy be-
cause of its turning from the forests to
the homes of men. The hermit remains
q hermit, but the wood thrush comes to
our suburban places and makes himself
at home, much to the satisfaction of all.