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Thrush's flutelike sound a sign of spring
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Photo
The wood thrush has a melodic and haunting sound.
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Published: April 22, 2008
Updated: 04/21/2008 09:05 pm
The things that signal the arrival of spring differ from one person to the next. For some, it is the blooming of redbuds and dogwoods. Others find that the sounds of spring peepers and chorus frogs herald the coming of spring. For some, it is the slow, pale greening of the trees.
But for me it is the song of the wood thrush. Melodic, haunting and beautiful, it has been described by various authors as ethereal, liquid, rich, gurgling, calm, sweet, unhurried, peaceful, … and often, flutelike.
Wood thrushes start arriving from Central America sometime in April. Just as wildflowers begin emerging in earnest and the landscape warms from the drab colors of winter to the hopeful shades of spring, the bell-like tones of wood thrushes start to ring in our woods.
The wood thrush is a handsome bird, if not quite beautiful. It has rich reddish-chestnut upper parts -- head, back, wings and tail -- with the head more reddish than the rest. Its under parts are white with lots of large black round spots. It is a little smaller than a robin, but has a similar build -- it is rather plump in the breast.
Several species can be seen
The wood thrush is just one of five species of thrushes that can be seen in North Carolina and Virginia. The others -- the hermit thrush, veery, Swainson's thrush and gray-cheeked thrush -- all look a lot like the wood thrush.
They are a bit drabber in appearance with colors ranging from warm brown to olive and can be sorted out one from the other by slight differences in the amount and intensity of spotting on the breast and coloration of the upper parts. A sixth species, Bicknell's thrush, passes through Eastern North Carolina, but it is the rarest of these thrushes and difficult to distinguish from the gray-cheeked thrush.
Thrush songs are similar, too. All may be described as beautiful and flutelike. But differences in the songs provide better clues to distinguishing the species than differences in appearance.
The song of the wood thrush is described as a flutelike ee-o-lay. The hermit thrush has a voice that is clear and ethereal, still flutelike, with three or four phrases at different pitches. The song of Swainson's thrush sounds like it is spiraling upward. The veery's song spirals downward in pitch, while the gray-cheeked has a descending spiral like the veery, but is higher, thinner and nasal with stuttering pauses.
They are best heard at dawn and dusk when males are proclaiming that they have secured the best possible habitat for nesting and rearing young. As with most bird species, song serves two main functions: to announce to other males that a stake has been claimed on a certain piece of real estate, and to attract a mate.
The wood thrush is the only one that breeds throughout the eastern United States, although the veery does breed in the higher elevations of the North Carolina and Virginia mountains as well as the northeastern United States, the Rocky Mountain states and southern Canada.
The hermit thrush is the only one that spends the winter here. All the others are just passing through during spring migration in April and May and fall migration in September. Most thrushes nest well to the north, mostly in Canada.
All but the hermit thrush spend the winter in the neotropics -- Central America and South America. Like so many neotropical migrants, habitat loss and habitat degradation at both ends of the migratory routes are resulting in drastic declines in population.
Most of the thrushes occupy mature forests at one or both ends of their life-cycle routes, and large scale timbering and forest degradation throughout the Americas have greatly reduced these essential habitats. The wood thrush has been placed on the Audubon Society's and the American Bird Conservancy's WatchList, their register of American birds that are at the greatest risk. The wood thrush breeding population in North Carolina has declined by an alarming 65 percent in recent years.
You can look and listen for the thrushes at several locations in our area when they are migrating in the spring, at about the same time that the wood thrush is establishing breeding territory. Since all favor wooded habitat, you can look for them at any of several parks in the area including Pilot Mountain, Hanging Rock and Stone Mountain. In Winston-Salem, the nature trails at Reynolda Gardens, Bethabara and Salem Lake are good places to find them, as is Tanglewood Park in Clemmons.
Males sometimes sing from perches high in the trees, but thrushes are found mostly near the ground, quiet and inconspicuous.
If you want to be able to distinguish one thrush from another, various field guides, readily available in local bookstores and bird-supply shops, provide illustrations, details of the differences between species and descriptions of their songs. Recordings of songs are widely available, too.
Clearly, differentiating these songs takes some practice and experience. But the ability to link the correct name of the bird with its song may be important only if you are a serious birder. Otherwise, it is best to simply listen … and savor the voices of spring. It's the best music that nature has to offer.
WE WERE WRONG
Last week we noted the Habitat for Humanity BirdFest date incorrectly. The correct dates are May 1-3. For more information, call 765-8854.
■ Bird's-Eye View is joint column by Ron Morris and Phil Dickinson. Today's column was written by Morris. Morris retired after 24 years as curator at the N.C. Zoo. He has studied birds on four continents, 22 countries and many islands. Dickinson is a legal writer. He has been an active birder for 15 years, and is currently president of the Audubon Society of Forsyth County. If you have a birding question or story idea, write to Bird's-Eye View in care of Features, Winston-Salem Journal, P.O. Box 3159, Winston-Salem, N.C. 27101-3159, or send an e-mail to birding@wsjournal.com. Please type "birds" in the subject line.
» AUDIO: Click to hear the the song of the wood thrush
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