Everything about The Hermit Thrush totally explained
The
Hermit Thrush (
Catharus guttatus) is a medium-sized
North American
thrush. It isn't very closely related to the other North American
migrant species of
Catharus, but rather to the
Mexican Russet Nightingale-thrush (Winker & Pruett, 2006).
Description
This species is 15–17 cm in length, and has the white-dark-white underwing pattern characteristic of
Catharus thrushes. Adults are mainly brown on the upperparts, with reddish tails. The underparts are white with dark spots on the breast and grey or brownish flanks. They have pink legs and a white eye ring. Birds in the east are more olive-brown on the upperparts; western birds are more grey-brown.
Behaviour
Their breeding habitat is
coniferous or mixed woods across
Canada,
Alaska and the northeastern and western
United States. They make a cup nest on the ground or relatively low in a tree.
Hermit Thrushes migrate to wintering grounds in the southern
United States and south to
Central America. Although they usually only breed in forests, Hermit Thrushes will sometimes winter in parks and wooded suburban neighborhoods. They are very rare vagrants to western
Europe.
They forage on the forest floor, also in trees or shrubs, mainly eating insects and berries.
Song
The Hermit Thrush's song
(External Link
) is ethereal and flute-like, constructed from a descending musical phrase repeated at different pitches. They often sing from a high open location.
Hermit Thrush in popular culture
The Hermit Thrush is the
state bird of
Vermont.
Walt Whitman construes the Hermit Thrush as a symbol of the American voice, poetic and otherwise, in his elegy for Abraham Lincoln, "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd,"
(External Link) one of the fundamental texts in the American literary canon. This bird first appears in another canonical poem, Whitman's "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking."
"A Hermit Thrush"
(External Link) is the name of a poem by the American poet
Amy Clampitt.
Former Canadian
indie-rock band
Thrush Hermit took their name from a reversal of the two parts. It is also shared by the American bands Hermit Thrushes and
Hermit Thrush.
A Hermit Thrush appears in the fifth section ("What the Thunder Said") of the
T. S. Eliot poem
The Waste Land.
Image:HermitThrush63.jpg|Ocala National Forest, FL 2008
Further Information
Get more info on 'Hermit Thrush'.
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