Beautiful Bird Songs

     Long ago on a sixth grade field trip to Valley Forge, I stepped off the bus and heard a couple of pretty bird songs that started with a few notes, followed by an ascending trill, in a nearby field of tall weeds and scattered sapling trees.  Having seen a pair of eastern bluebirds in a similar field near home, I thought those beautiful songs were emitted by male bluebirds.  Later, when I knew bird songs better, I realized those songs I heard at Valley Forge were from male field sparrows.
     Males of several kinds of attractive small birds in southeastern Pennsylvania, as elsewhere, sing lovely songs in summer, including eastern bluebirds, field sparrows and indigo buntings.  Their delightful songs are part of their courting a mate and defending a nesting territory during summer in the thickets of hedgerows, overgrown pastures and woodland edges.  Male bluebirds are sky-blue on top with rufous chests and white bellies, while females are gray on top with blue wings and tails.  Field sparrows are brown all over with darker markings for camouflage.  And male indigos are dark-blue all over while their mates are brown to blend into their surroundings,  Bluebird songs are short series of a few gentle, bubbly notes in each.  As stated, each field sparrow song is composed of a few introductory notes, followed by a sweet trill.  Indigo songs are delightful ditties of twice-repeated notes.  Male indigos sing much of each summer day, including hot mid-afternoons and at sunset and into the dusk.         
     Wood thrushes, which are related to American robins, and wood pewees, a kind of flycatcher, are woodland species in the eastern United States in summer.  They sing beautiful, melancholy songs off and on all day that warms many a human heart.  But their music seems especially lovely when heard at dusk.  The thrushes' songs are flute-like and seem to say "a-o-lee" or "e-o-lay".  Pewee songs are a gentle, often repeated "pee-a-wee" followed by a downward slurring "peeee-urrr".   
     Wood thrushes and pewees sing from lower twigs on younger trees where they are sometimes visible to us.  Wood thrushes are warm-brown on top and white below with dark spots, camouflage on woodland floors.  Pewees are dusky-gray all over to blend into the shadows of woodlands. 
     Eastern meadowlarks are not common in southeastern Pennsylvania because they nest in tall-grass meadows and fields, of which there are few in this area.  Meadowlarks are brown above with darker streaking for camouflage and yellow below with a dark V on their chest.  The males' magical songs are whistled gently and repeatedly "three-up, three-down", with notes that do run up, then down, the musical scale.
     White-throated sparrows sing the prettiest of songs in winter in this area.  These sparrows nest farther north, but winter in thickets here, including in older suburban areas, throughout much of the United States.  When entering shrubbery each dusk in winter to spend the night, all the birds in white-throat flocks chip, and males whistle several series of two long, sweet notes in each one, followed by four short ones, all on the same pleasant pitch.  Finally as dusk settles, the birds are silent.
     These are some of the small bird species that sing the most lovely of songs.  Get out at any time of year, but especially in spring and summer, to listen to the many beautiful bird songs in this area.