286 NOTES ON THE 



SCOLECOPHAGUS CYANOCEPHALUS (Wagler). (510.) 

 BREWER'S BLACKBIRD. 



The migrating movements of this beautiful blackbird do not 

 differ from those of the Rusty Blackbird, arriving and depart- 

 ing at or about the same times, viz: about April first, and 

 about November first. They breed abundantly along the Red 

 river from Big Stone lake to the Canada line, and eastwardly 

 along the shores of the woodland lakes and streams to Mille 

 Lacs in Crow Wing county, and less commonly considerably 

 further south. 



Mr. Washburn found them at Georgetown, Ada and St. Vin- 

 cent, August first, old and young in such numbers as to justify 

 the supposition that they breed there. Mr. Lewis reports 

 them in large numbers embracing the young still further east 

 in the same month. 



Wherever their breeding habits have been observed in either 

 Minne.sota or DaKota it has been noted that they do not do so 

 in large communities. A few pairs will be somewhat associ- 

 ated, but often only one in a locality. And they almost as 

 often select dry, as swampy sections. The nest is a large 

 structure compactly built of twigs and finer materials, like 

 dried grasses, rootlets, weed-bark and lined with hair. Some 

 nests have considerable mud wrought in, but others have none 

 at all. The eggs, five to six in number, are a dull greenish 

 gray, with several shades of brown in small spots, some of 

 which are light and others dark, very irregular in their out- 

 lines. 



Doctor Coues in his Birds of The Northwest, page 201, has 

 given so true a description of some of the characteristic habits 

 of this species that I cannot do better than to quote it. He 

 says: "Troops of twenty, fifty, a hundred are commonly seen; 

 they have no special fondness for watery places, but scour the 

 open, dry ground, and scatter among straggling pines and oaks; 

 they come fearlessly into the clearings about houses, the 

 traveller's camp, and the stock-j'^ards, gleaning plentiful sub- 

 sistence from man's bounty or wastfulness. Much of their 

 time is spent on the ground, rambling in hurried, eager search 

 for grain and insects; they generally run with nimble steps, 

 hopping being the exception, when they have satisfied their 

 hunger, and are moving leisurely with no particular object in 

 view. The movements are all easy and graceful, the bird's 

 trim form and glossy color setting it off to great advantage. 



