Dipper or Ouzd WESTERN BIRDS 



sight. However, as I watched I heard the noisy squeal 

 of young birds and caught a glimpse of a dark object 

 against the stony wall that rose perpendicularly above 

 the water. Surely there could be no nest in that bare 

 wall of seemingly solid rock? But as I marveled an 

 Ouzel flew up to a small round hole, poised a moment 

 on the edge, and darted away, followed by the noisy, 

 squealing calls of young. 



In the first five minutes of watching, the birds fed five 

 times. In twenty minutes they fed fifteen times, making 

 an almost continuous performance. There seemed to be 

 no particular method in the feeding, both birds flying 

 up and down stream, sometimes darting directly away 

 from the nest on a foraging trip, and at other times rest- 

 ing for a moment on the big rock near the fall, or on a 

 smaller one in mid-stream below the nest. They never 

 tarried at the nest-hole, but poised long enough at the 

 edge to feed, then were away. 



I have always supposed that the Ouzel built where the 

 spray touched the nest, but I do not believe that it 

 reached this one, although I could get no nearer than 

 the footbridge, about fifty feet above. 



I could see that the water dashed against the opposite 

 wall far below the nest but, so far as I could see, it did 

 not go across and up to the nest. The stream, as I 

 stepped it off on the bridge, was not more than twelve 

 or fifteen feet wide. The rocky wall must have been 

 seventy-five feet high, having shrubs and trees at the 

 top, with a few flowers and bushy growths to one side 

 and not far above the nest. A part of the wall where 

 the sun never reached was moss-covered. The nest was 

 seemingly in solid rock, there being no visible depression 

 in the surface at that place. It was surrounded by moss 

 and just above it grew a small bunch of grass which 

 was about three inches high and had red upper tips, or 

 perhaps tiny flowers. This helped me to locate the nest- 



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