The wood thrush is 7.5-8.5 inches (19-21.6 cm) in length with a wingspan of 11.8-13.4 inches (30-34 cm).
The wood thrush’s head, back, and wings are brick red in color. It has a white belly speckled with dark spots.
Its red coloring helps it stay camouflaged in the leaf litter while it hunts for insects on the forest floor.
The wood thrush lives in deciduous and mixed forests. It prefers a habitat where there is a mix of large trees and younger trees to make up the understory, shade on the ground, and lots of leaf litter on the ground.
The wood thrush is an omnivore. It eats insects and fruit. During the breeding season, it feeds on invertebrates that live in leaf litter on the ground, such as spiders, beetles, flies, woodlice, and ants.
In preparation for migration, the wood thrush feeds on fruit such as blueberry, holly, elderberry, Virginia creeper, pokeweed, and dogwood.
The female wood thrush builds a nest in the lower branches of a small tree or shrub. She forms the nest out of grass, leaves, and stems, weaving the walls until they are 2-6 inches (5.1-15.2 cm) high and 4-6 inches (10.2-15.2 cm) across. She then lines the inside of the nest with mud and covers the bottom with fine roots.
She lays 3-4 turquoise eggs. The eggs are incubated for 12-15 days. Upon hatching, the chicks stay in the nest for another two weeks. The wood thrush usually lays 3-4 eggs twice each summer. She makes a new nest for each brood.
The wood thrush has a lifespan of 2-9 years in the wild.
The male sings a clear “ee-oh-lay” that is easily heard throughout its forest home in the spring and early summer. In most songbird species, males answer a rival’s call with the same song. The wood thrush almost always matches a rival’s song with a different song.
Although the wood thrush is still common throughout our forests, its population is declining. Scientists believe that one reason is cowbirds.
Adult cowbirds often lay eggs in a wood thrush’s nest. The young cowbird is larger than a wood thrush chick and demands more space and food.
In some habitats, scientists have found at least one cowbird egg in nearly every wood thrush nest.
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The wood thrush breeds across New Hampshire, although it is less common in the White Mountains and is not found at higher elevations. It migrates south in the fall.
A migratory bird, the wood thrush travels from the eastern United States to Central America each year.
In the summer, the wood thrush breeds in the eastern half of the United States from southeastern Canada down through Northern Florida.
It spends winters in the lowland tropical forests of Central America.
