THE SMALL FLYCATCHEBS. 187 



little flycatchers. The phoebe is the only bird that habitually 

 builds under bridges or inside of deserted houses, and any fly- 

 catcher's nest discovered in such a place may be safely called 

 hers. A nest in an evergreen tree near the water, saddled 

 high up on an outstretched limb, is the olive-sided flycatcher's; 

 but this is a rare, northern species. A flycatcher's nest found 

 upon the ground is the yellow-bellied flycatcher's, and this 

 will be sure to be a bulky nest of moss and leaves sunk in a 

 mossy bank or between tree roots, in evergreen growth and 

 usually near running water. A flycatcher's nest found low 

 down in a bush near water is the Traill's, or the alder fly- 

 catcher's, which builds a bulky nest about four feet from the 

 ground, in the upright forks of a willow, alder, or aspen, or 

 even, in the Northwest, among ferns. The chebec builds a 

 smaller nest, puts it higher up, usually selects an apple tree or 

 some bush or tree near cultivated land. She lays a bufly 

 white egg, not speckled like the Traill's flycatcher and the 

 wood pewee's, and very much smaller than the big spotted egg 

 of the kingbird, which chooses similar places. The Acadian, 

 or green-crested flycatcher, lives among beech woods prin- 

 cipally ; and there in the end fork of a drooping branch, such 

 a x)lace as a red-eyed vireo would choose, constructs a shallow, 

 flimsy nest, not to be mistaken for the vireo's deep cup 

 wrought of birch-bark and hornet's nest. The wood pewee 

 builds a shallow nest and saddles it upon a limb high up in 

 a maple or other shade tree — a nest noticeably unlike the 

 deeper, cup-shaped nests of most of the other small flycatch- 

 ers. Thus each one has her own way of building, though all 

 dress and look nearly alike, and by the house they leave be- 

 hind them, we may identify the bird that made it, though if 

 we had the bird in our own hands we might not be able to tell 

 its name. 



