CATALOGUE OF CANADIAN BIRDS. 723 



regularly distributed in families or large flocks, all the way to Fort 

 Yukon, fifteen miles above which I saw a flock, August 21st. At St. 

 Michael, I took a young female in first winter plumage, September 

 2oth. Young able to fly were taken, July 5th, and moulting birds, 

 August 13th. We took adults in full moult, June 27th, and one in 

 which the moult was almost completed, July 24th. (Bishop.) At 

 our winter camp, on the Kowak, Kotzebue sound, Alaska, this 

 species was common up to September. After that date and up to 

 the first of April, but one or two at a time were seen and then only 

 at long intervals. Early in September, groups of four to seven were 

 noted nearly every day in the spruces around the cabin. Those 

 chickadees observed during the winter were all in the dense willow 

 thickets along Hunt river. By the first of May, the chickadees 

 were back again roving through the woods in pairs. Old wood- 

 pecker holes were selected as nesting sites, and I spotted nests in 

 process of construction by the 15th May, but through various mis- 

 haps I failed to secure any eggs. (Grinnell.) 



Breeding Notes. — On July 22nd of this year (1903), whilst 

 tramping through a large cedar swamp, I became interested in ths 

 actions of a Hudsonian chickadee. I watched it for some time 

 searching for insects, when suddenly it disappeared behind a small 

 cedar with a larva in its bill. I did not expect to find a nest, as the 

 top of the tree was green, but, on going around on the other side, 

 perceived a small almost circular hole with jagged edges, about 

 twelve feet from the ground. On rapping the treee, the bird left and 

 became very much excited, nervously flitting back and forth from 

 the nest. Cutting away a portion of the wood, I found the nest to 

 contain young a few days old, six of them, I think. The spot 

 chosen for the nest-site was the best that could be found in the 

 swamp, situated, as it was, on a small spruce knoll near by an ice 

 cold spring which fed a small brook. The tree, as I mentioned, was 

 still green at the top, but from the nest cavity down was decayed 

 and hollow at the core. Returning some time after this, to give the 

 young a chance to vacate, I found the nest to be about ten inches 

 below the entrance hole, which was two inches in diameter. It was 

 composed of particles of moss, lichens and strips of soft inner bark 

 of the cedar, felted together with rabbit's and deer's hair. (L. M. 

 Terrill.) 

 46 J^ 



