STATUS: Common in parts of its range.
HABITAT: During summer, inhabits dry thickets in wooded and farming country, brushy pastures, second-growth woods, fencerows, brier patches, roadsides, and sometimes shrubbery of gardens.
SPECIAL HABITAT REQUIREMENTS: Low, dense, woody vegetation for nesting and cover.
NEST: Builds a bulky nest in any of a variety of shrubs (usually thorny) or low trees, up to 14 feet from the ground, but sometimes on the ground under a small shrub.
FOOD: Gleans food from the ground or in shrubs. In spring, eats almost entirely insects, spiders and worms; in summer and fall, eats mostly fruits, mast (mainly acorns), and waste corn.
REFERENCES: DeGraff et al. 1980, Forbush and May 1955, Kaufman in Farrand 1983c, Terres 1980.