THE PHCEBE 



colored junco, for it has a dusky head, back, wings, tail, 

 and breast, with a white belly. Professor Beal writes 

 of this bird as follows: "The black phoebe has the same 

 habits as its eastern relative, both as to selection of food 

 and nesting sites, preferring for the latter purpose some 

 structure of man, as a shed, or, better still a bridge over 

 a stream of water, and the preference of the black phoebe 

 for the vicinity of water is very pronounced. One may 

 always be found at a stream or pool and often at a 

 watering-trough by the roadside. 



"Careful study of the habits of the bird shows that it ob- 

 tains a large portion of its food about wet places. While 

 camping beside a stream in California the writer took 

 some pains to observe the habits of the black phoebe. The 

 nesting season was over, and the birds had nothing to do 

 but eat. This they appeared to be doing all the time. 

 When first obsei-ved in the morning, at the first glimmer 

 of daylight, a phoebe was always found flitting from rock 

 to rock, although it was so dusky that the bird could hardly 

 be seen. This a'ctivity was kept up all day. Even in 

 the evening, when it was so dark that notes were written 

 by the aid of the camp fire, the phoebe was still engaged 

 in its work of collecting, though it was difficult to under- 

 stand how it could catch insects when there was scarcely 

 light enough to see the bird. Exploration of the stream 

 showed that every portion of it was patrolled by a phoebe, 

 that each one apparently did not range over more than 

 twelve or thirteen rods of water, and that sometimes two 

 or three were in close proximity.' 



" 2 



2 Farmers' Bulletin 630, U. S. Dept, of Agriculture, Biological Survey. 



[113] 



