TOWNSEND SOLITAIRE. Myadestes townsendi (Audubon)

Field characters.—Body about one-third bulk of Robin; tail long, as long as body. General coloration gray; tail narrowly white margined; a narrow circle of white around eye. (See pl. 11a). A broad band of pale buff shows forth on middle of wing in flight. Demeanor quiet; flight rather slow, faltering. Voice: Male has an elaborate song comparable in some respects with that of Black-headed Grosbeak; call note a mellow metallic clink; less often a harsh chack.

Occurrence.—Moderately common summer visitant in Canadian Zone (locally in Transition); more numerous on west slope of Sierra Nevada than on east side. Recorded from Hazel Green and Chinquapin eastward to Tenaya and Merced lakes; also near Mono Craters. Common during winter season in Transition Zone as in Yosemite Valley, about El Portal, and on slopes above Coulterville. In fall recorded once at Tuolumne Meadows, and commonly at Glen Aulin, and, on eastern slope, on Tioga road near Warren Fork of Leevining Creek and on Williams Butte. During summer lives in forest, chiefly amid red firs, males singing at tops of trees, females nesting on ground. At other seasons frequents berry-producing trees and shrubs. Solitary or loosely gregarious.

Well rewarded are those nature lovers who upon visiting the Yosemite climb to the slopes far above the Valley floor to listen to the song of the Townsend Solitaire. The bird may be sought for with confidence in the deep fir forest just south of Glacier Point, or on the timbered slopes above Yosemite Point and along the Eagle Peak trail. The song season is not as with many birds, restricted to the spring and early summer; but the autumn and even winter witnesses occasional outbursts of song, fully as melodious as those of the summer, and more impressive in the prevailing chill and silence.

The plain gray coloration and comparatively long tail of the Townsend Solitaire readily distinguish it from all other birds save perhaps the female or young of the California Pine Grosbeak. The solitaire has in addition a narrow white marking on the tail, a buff bar on the wing which shows clearly when the bird is in flight, and a small bill; any or all of these features will serve to distinguish it from the grosbeak. (See pl. 11a). Furthermore, the solitaire keeps to the Canadian and Transition zones, whereas the pine grosbeak rarely strays from the higher Hudsonian Zone; the two will therefore not likely be seen in the same place. Young (juvenal) solitaires are heavily mottled on the breast, much in the manner of thrushes and young robins, thereby perhaps indicating their relationship; but this 'family' resemblance (in a systematic sense) disappears at the first fall molt, and the young then become indistinguishable from their parents.

The Townsend Solitaire as a species does not, in the Yosemite region, make much of a change in its haunts with the passage of the seasons. In summer the majority are to be found in and about the red fir forests of the Canadian Zone. At other times of year the birds forage and live in the western junipers which often grow close by on rocky slopes, or else they drop to the Transition Zone where mistletoe berries on the golden oaks afford bounteous forage. There are no solitaires in Yosemite Valley during the summer months, but with the coming of winter the oaks on the talus slopes become tenanted by numbers of the birds. We ourselves did not find the species at any station lower than El Portal (altitude 2000 feet) where it was seen but once, on March 1, 1916; but Mr. Donald D. McLean reports that solitaires are fairly common on the slopes above Coulterville (at 2000 feet altitude or higher) during some winters. The movements of the species during the winter are controlled chiefly by the food supply, in the form of berries.

As an indication of the numbers in which this bird occurs in the Yosemite region, we cite the following notebook censuses. Along the trail to Eagle Peak, on June 4, 1915, 8 were seen or heard between 12:30 and 4:10 P.M. Among the junipers on a south-facing slope near Glen Aulin, on September 30, 1915, 23 were seen in 3 hours. Three were seen and 8 heard in 20 minutes on the Big Oak Flat grade, at 4500 feet altitude, on December 28, 1914. These last two enumerations are maxima, the result of concentration where conditions were most favorable for the species.

The song of the Townsend Solitaire must be heard to be appreciated. No description can suffice. The notes are many of them clear, rich, and full, but of a sort which does not permit of rendition in syllables of human speech. In general effect the song resembles most closely that of the Black-headed Grosbeak, while certain notes or phrases recall the songs of the Western Mockingbird and California Thrasher. The song lacks set character, being much varied, and it is long sustained. 'Rests' of greater or less length are interpolated at irregular intervals. In summer much singing is done in the early morning and late afternoon hours; in colder weather some of the best songs are heard during the middle of the day. During the courting and nesting season the males do most of their singing while perched near the tops of lofty firs, but in the fall and early winter the birds sing in the low-growing junipers or oaks not many feet above the ground. A lofty circling flight accompanied by voluble singing is sometimes witnessed, again reminding the observer of the Black-headed Grosbeak.

The usual call given by the Townsend Solitaire is a single clink, not loud yet far-carrying, metallic yet mellow. It has been likened to the creaking of a wood-wagon coming down a cañon or to the sound produced by an old windlass. The quality is such that it seems to echo, first from one direction, then from another. "Bell-like" has been used as a descriptive term, but fails to quite express the idea. To some hearers this note is so much like the whistle of the California Ground Squirrel that the observer is tempted to seek as the source of the note a mammal on the ground rather than a bird at the top of a tree. And, indeed, the peculiar ventriloquial quality serves to further this misdirection of attention. Less often, and, so far as our experience goes, only during the winter season, a solitaire when highly excited will utter a harsh chack, much like the note of a Red-winged Blackbird.

The bird student, to find the nest of the Townsend Solitaire, would search in vain the lofty trees where the male bird does his singing, for the female places her nest far below, on the ground. A steeply cut bank with protruding rootlets and niches left by dislodged stones, or the tangle of roots and earth at the base of some overturned forest tree makes a favored nesting place. The nest departs widely from the type constructed by robins and thrushes, not being composed of mud, and being so loosely put together that it can seldom be lifted intact from its placement.

A typical nest was found beside the Glacier Point road at about the 7000 foot level two miles above Chinquapin in June, 1915. (See pl. 55b). It was in a cut bank, three feet above the road and two feet below the top of the bank, in a depression in the earth between rocks and at the base of a young fir tree the outstretching roots of which partially concealed the nest. As is usual with the solitaire, a straggling 'tail' or apron of material extended down the bank a foot or so from the nest proper. The constituent materials of the latter were slender dead fir twigs and old, brown needles of sugar and Jeffrey pines. Inside, the nest was about 3 inches (80 mm.) across and 2 inches (50 mm.) deep. On June 10 there were 2 eggs, by June 12, 4. On each visit to the nest the female bird was seen sitting, but she slipped off quietly and flew out of sight up the road. Once the male was heard singing from among the dense firs near by.

Solitaires at nesting time are notably unobtrusive birds. They haunt shady places. Their color tone is neutral. They can keep perfectly still, minutes at a time, and when they do move their motions are of a sort which do not catch the observer's eye quickly. Thus a female solitaire, whose nesting site is in plain view at the side of a well-traveled road, may come and go throughout the whole nesting period without ever giving any clear indication that her interests in the locality are more than casual. Her attitude, to outward appearances, is wholly the opposite of that of a robin or a junco.

During spring and summer the Townsend Solitaire subsists mainly upon insects, many of which it captures on the wing, flycatcher-fashion. The flight of the bird, however, is not swift; nor is it direct, as is that of the Olive-sided Flycatcher, for example; it reminds one rather of the Say Phoebe, in that the wings are widely spread and flapped rather slowly, and the flight course is irregularly circuitous. A solitaire watched July 1, 1915, at the head of the upper Yosemite Falls trail, was keeping close about the garbage cans maintained at the shaded lunch grounds there. The bird every now and then flew out past a can in pursuit of some foraging insect; then he sought another nearby perch, where he would sit quietly with only an occasional turn of the head. The light eye-ring gave the bird a large-eyed, passive expression, quite the opposite of that of the sharp-eyed, alert warblers. Sometimes a solitaire will perch on boulders or rocks on the ground, where it looks still more like a Say Phoebe.

Through the nesting season the solitaire, as we have said, is a rather reclusive species; but in fall and early winter its demeanor changes. Then, in suitable places, it is one of the most active and most conspicuous of the birds present. Near our camp in Glen Aulin during late September and early October of 1915, solitaires had congregated in considerable numbers to feast on the then abundant, ripening berries of the western juniper. The birds were busiest in the morning and along toward evening, but the middle of the day brought only slight diminution in their activity. Just as the sun came up over the rocky ridges to the east and touched the tips of the junipers, the solitaires would break forth in song nearly or quite as ecstatic as that of early summer, excelling in both quality and volume all other voices in the Glen. Sometimes during the mid-day hours one individual would give chase to another and occasionally a third bird joined the pursuit. Not infrequently one or another of the group would burst into song as it flew. No other bird of the Yosemite, except perhaps the American Dipper, seems to have quite such a revival of song in the fall as does the solitaire. The pleasant warmth of the mid-day sun and the melodious songs of the solitaires made it difficult to believe that the season was autumn. Only when one noted the dead dry herbage and the falling leaves was the near approach of winter manifest.

Examination of the ground beneath the trees where these birds were assembled revealed many berries of the season, still green, which had been pulled off, crushed in the bill, and then dropped. Not only were these numerous, but dried berries of previous crops were found with similar 'bill marks,' indicating that in years gone by the solitaires had resorted to these same trees during the fall months. A bird taken at this time was found to have nothing in its stomach and gizzard except the berries and seeds of the juniper.

At Gentrys, on December 28, 1914, with much snow on the ground there, Solitaires were plentiful, and were feeding on the dry berries of the Mariposa manzanita (A. mariposa), along with Western Robins and Varied Thrushes.

The stands of golden oaks, so heavily parasitized by mistletoe, which cover the warm sun-facing slopes on the north side of Yosemite Valley, are extensively patronized by solitaires during the winter time. At almost any hour of the day, from late September until the end of December and possibly even later, the birds may be sought there with assurance. There, as among the junipers, the diet is a monotonous one, consisting solely of mistletoe berries, which the birds swallow entire. The fleshy part of the berry is dissolved off, leaving a sticky-coated seed. Two of these were found adhering to the tail feathers of a captured solitaire, and the excrement of the birds contained many of the seeds. This suggests that the solitaire is quite likely an agent, along with the bluebirds, in distributing this parasite. This three-cornered arrangement between oaks, mistletoe, and solitaires has probably been in age-long existence, fluctuating in one direction or another according to the fortunes of the individual members.