Long-Billed Marsh Wren (Cistothorus Palustris) Wren Family
[Called also: MARSH WREN, AOU 1998]

Length -- 4.5 to 5.2 inches. Actually a little smaller than the English sparrow. Apparently half the size. Male and Female -- Brown above, with white line over the eye, and the back irregularly and faintly streaked with white. Wings and tail barred with darker cinnamon-brown. Underneath white. Sides dusky. Tail long and often carried erect. Bill extra long and slender. Range -- United States and southern British America. Migrations -- May. September. Summer resident.

Sometimes when you are gathering cat-tails in the river marshes an alert, nervous little brown bird rises startled from the rushes and tries to elude you as with short, jerky flight it goes deeper and deeper into the marsh, where even the rubber boot may not follow. It closely resembles two other birds found in such a place, the swamp sparrow and the short-billed marsh wren; but you may know by its long, slender bill that it is not the latter, and by the absence of a bright bay crown that it is not the shyest of the sparrows.