BLACK OR IRIDESCEXT BLACK 413 



birds differ from the other California blackbirds in being 

 found less often in the lowland marshes or tule swamps. 

 Abundant throughout the State, tliey breed chiefly be- 

 tween the highest altitudes and three thousand feet 

 above sea level. Their choice of a l)uilding site is varied. 

 In Lower California they have been found nesting in 

 pine ; in western Oregon they sometimes choose an old 

 woodpecker's hole one hundred feet from the ground ; 

 while in the same State nests have been found on the 

 ground, the rim being flush with the surface. At Del 

 Monte a colony nested in the top of a group of tree 

 yuccas, and at Tallac, on Lake Tahoe, I found them nest- 

 ing on the rotten piles of an abandoned pier. In com- 

 pany with them were tree sw^allows ; and one pair of 

 fearless feathered mites, known as pygmy nuthatches, 

 had excavated a home in a leaning pile that towered 

 above the rest. Li a low, broken post that raised its 

 crumbling top scarcely two feet from the water a mother 

 I^hickbird brooded day after day, entirely exposed to 

 view, close to a pier where children played. Strangest 

 of all, the post was the customary mooring place of a 

 rowboat, the loop of rope being removed and replaced 

 several times daily, and always rubbing the nest as it was 

 passed over. Yet the motlier bird refused to leave it, 

 and only flattened her body and crouched in terror as 

 the rope was lifted. After the little ones were hatched, 

 June 8, her distress increased, for now a careless move 

 of the boatman might easily overthrow them into the 

 water. One or other of the anxious parents sat on a 

 splintered point of the post just over the nest and 



