136 The Ottawa Naturalist. [Nov. 



Chestnut -sided and Canadian Warblers, is almost universal with 

 the White-throat in this district. Having examined a great 

 many nests I can only record two or three instances in which 

 the bird has returned to lay, after being flushed from an empty 

 nest or from a nest containing one or two eggs. 



On the other hand, if the bird has commenced incubating 

 she will rarely desert. I have never identified an egg as having 

 been removed from an abandoned nest to a new one, yet I am 

 quite satisfied that this is a common occurrence; at least, any 

 eggs in a nest at the time of abandonment will have disappeared 

 on a return visit. More than this, the birds will often remove a 

 quantity of lining, no doubt to serve in a new venture. 



The nest is a s .ostantial structure, usually built on the 

 ground, and the bi:d is fastidious in regard to certain materials 

 apparentl)' necessary to give satisfaction. Various substances 

 compose the body of the nest; generally plant stalks, withered 

 grasses and bark shreds, on a foundation of skeleton leaves, with 

 a lining simiilar to that employed by the Swamp Sparrow, 

 usually of bleached grasses. The main distinction from other 

 sparrows' nests lies in the outer rim of green mosses which is 

 never, to my knovi^ledge, absent ; often suggesting in this respect 

 nests of the Plioebe Flycatcher. Sometimes, in very wet woods, 

 there v>'ill he an additional understructure of particles of decayed 

 wood, raising the nest slighl ly and permitting of drainage. 

 Moisture is apparently essential to the White-throat's welfare 

 at this season; possibly they would have no objection to nesting 

 in a dry bare place (the Ovenbird safely combats the disad- 

 vantages of ground nesting in the barest of woods) were it not 

 that the swamps contain their chosen food. Occasionally, in 

 hilly country with a predominant growth of conifers, the White- 

 throat will cohabit ate with Juncos on the dry slopes of hill 

 pastures, when the nest is usually built in the thick of some 

 shrubby evergreen bush. In the same locality, down in the 

 tamarack-girt .sphagnumi bogs, it is also usual to find the nest 

 above ground; the respective lack and density of undergrowth 

 being chiefly responsible for this departure. Above all other 

 spots, an opening, either path or glade, in damp evergreen 

 woods is chosen, v/hile adjoining Black Ash swamps usually 

 accommodate a few pairs. The opening in thick woods is essen- 

 tial as little shade suffices; secondly, this opening should be 

 carpeted vith ferns and grasses, and especiallv with the run- 

 ning vines of Swamp Raspberry and Bedstraw. Occasionally 

 the nest is built on top of a mossy mound or stump (especially 

 in the wetter woods) hidden beneath a canopy of ferns; but 

 more often it is hidden in a tangle of Bedstraw. 



Descriptions of eggs are usually inadequate except by com- 



