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This well-named bird is seldom found in summer away from stands of sagebrush. Smaller and shorter-billed than most thrashers, the Sage Thrasher may suggest a washed-out robin. During the breeding season, its melodious song can be heard incessantly at dawn on the sagebrush flats. The Sage Thrasher is sometimes elusive; if pursued closely it may seem to disappear, only to pop up on a bush top a hundred yards away.

The haunting songs of the Varied Thrush echo through the dense humid forests of the Pacific Northwest. Long minor-key whistles repeated after deliberate pauses, they seem like sounds without a source; only a careful searcher will find the bird itself. Although it looks superficially like a American Robin, the Varied Thrush is far more elusive, usually feeding on the ground among dense thickets. Typical of the far west, it sometimes surprises birders by straying all the way to the Atlantic Coast in winter.