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Guide to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park

items 107 of 144 items
  • wcu_great_smoky_mtns-2795.jpg
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  • permanent and others are visitors. They include the Cardinal, Crow, Flicker (nearly always transient in this part of the country), Bluebird, Robin, Belted Kingfisher, Chimney Swift, Tine Finch, Towhee, Indigo Bunting, Swainson Warbler, Hermit Thrush, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Purple Martin, Snowy Owl, Blue Heron (in the river valleys). Upland Plover, Snipe, Red-headed Woodpecker, Mountain Solitary Vireo, Black-throated Blue (or Cairn's) Warbler, Ovenbird and the Pileated Woodpecker. The typically Canadian birds—Black-capped Chickadee, brown Creeper, Crossbill, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Red- breasted Nuthatch, Junco and Winter Wren—were plentiful in Western North Carolina tit one time. When the virgin Spruce was logged these birds, which depend greatly on that tree for food, were driven into the fastnesses of the Great Smokies. The Crossbill, especially, was fitted by Nature with a bill peculiarly adapted to ripping apart the cones to reach the seeds on which it feeds. On the preservation of the last stands of virgin spruce and fir timber in the Great Smokies depends the continued existence, here, of these birds which are no longer seen in abundance. Thomas D. Burleigh believes that, with park protection, the shy Pileated Woodpecker, one of the largest and easily most striking woodpeckers and now almost extinct, will be 1'reserved and tend to increase in numbers, as will the Northern Raven. The establishment of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park came none too soon. Many animal-forms, now nearly extinct, could not have held out against hunters much longer. With protection, the Bear, Red Deer, Wild Turkey, Raven. Pileated Woodpecker and other rare forms will thrive and increase in numbers until they occupy, again, the virgin forests which are their rightful home. 107
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Object’s are ‘parent’ level descriptions to ‘children’ items, (e.g. a book with pages).