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 4 2 THE CONDOR Vol. IV A Trait of the Western Robin. HE object of this article is to further investigation by club mem- bers during the coming hinting season of a peculiarity of our friend the robin, that has, so far as I know, passed unnoticed by contributors to the CON- DOR, and that is the drooping of the bird's wings. For the benefit of the un- informed I will add that quite a large but variable percentage of the birds in a flock of robins droop their wings con- tinuously while feeding and infrequent- ly when perched elsewhere. Other arian species droop their wings at times but the habit does not seem to be so persistent in thenas it does in the robin and it is in regard to the value of this habit to the bird itself that I wish to gain the assistance of the club members. For a long time I have noticed that when juncos or goldfinches are pairing the wings of the male (and sometimes of the female) droop and flutter contin- uously while the bird is engaged in his amorous proposal to the female, and I have no doubt that these actions are of considerable benefit to the male birds in their annual courtships, as in some man- ner it expresses visibly to the female the depth and sincerity of the male bird's passion for her, and those nmles that were most adept in such actions might in some way mate more success- fully. Lately and infrequently I have noticed male juncos and goldfinches drooping their wings in the winter months, for what reason it is hard to say. And this habit being used by juncos in winter is possibly very similar to the drooping of the robin's wings at the same period. In order to find out if this trait is confined to one sex of robins and therefore of some sexual advantage to that sex, I recently shot quite a num- ber and noticed a lot more at close range through a glass carefully and I give the results below but as these re- sults are rather conflicting and only ob- tained from one locality, I place liitle value in them and think it best to sub- mit my imperfect results to the club members I)efore the opening of th mat- ing season so that those interested may pursue the subject more fully. In studying a species of birds sexually so nearly similar in plumage as the robins are, it is rather hard to avoid an occas- ionalerror and where I have been in doubt I have left the identity of the sex alone. TABLE OF RESULTS. TOTAL. sex Males. Males. emales. 'emales. nknown nknown birds. FOLDED 7 I x6 WINGS DROOPED ,3o TOTAL WINGS SEX FOLDED Males. Males Females. Females. _I5_ unknown[ unknown 2 7I I birds I 33 WINGS DROOPED 28 9 38 Sum total of 68 birds with drooping wings and 49 birds with folded wings. Joan J. WtLLX^MS, Applegate, Cal. February 8, 9o.
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