NORTHERN BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLER 295 



me the following note: "On Gull Island, about ten acres in extent, 

 which lies in northwestern Lake Michigan, we found the black- 

 throated green warbler in an unusual nesting niche. About half of 

 the island's area is northern hardwood forest, whose floor cover is 

 largely of American yew {Taxus canadensis) . At a height of but two 

 or three feet, among the sprays of this ground-hemlock, we discovered 

 two nests of the species named. Each of these, July 12, 1918, held four 

 eggs. There was a third nest, empty but evidently used that season." 



Nests have also been found in maples, in white, gray, and black 

 birches, in alders and probably in other deciduous trees and bushes. 

 And the following unusual nesting sites are of interest: William 

 Brewster (1906) mentions a nest that he found "in a barberry bush 

 growing in an open pasture at Arlington Heights, one hundred yards 

 or more from the nearest woods." He also has a nest, taken by C. H. 

 Watrous in Connecticut, that was on the ground "among a large 

 clump of ferns in a very low and damp place under a heavy growth 

 of hemlocks" (Brewster, 1895). John C. Brown (1889), of Portland, 

 Maine, mentions a nest that was built in a grapevine growing lux- 

 uriantly about a pagoda at some distance from any woods; it was 

 well hidden from the outside by the foliage, but in plain sight from 

 inside the pagoda. And B. S. Bowdish (1906) records a New Jersey 

 nest that "was built between the stems of a 'skunk cabbage' plant, and 

 fastened to a catbriar and the twigs of a dead bush, and was about 

 fourteen inches from the ground, in a very wet part of the swamp." 



Miss Stanwood (1910) watched a pair of black- throated green warb- 

 lers building a nest in a fir tree, of which she writes : 



First they laid knots of spider's sills and little curls of white birch bark in the 

 shape of the nest, on the horizontal fork about midway of a branch six feet long. 

 Next bits of fine grass, a little usnea moss, and cedar bark fibre. Both the male 

 and female worked on the nest, until observed, the female shaping it with the 

 breast each time they added a bit of material. Around the top were carefully 

 laid the finest gray spruce twigs. These were bound together with masses of 

 white spider's silk. The white curls of birch bark, the much weathered twigs, 

 the fluffy shining bands and knots of spider's silk, made a very dainty looking 

 structure. After the first morning, I did not see the male about the nest. As a 

 general thing, I find that, if birds are observed building, the male usually leaves 

 his part of the work to the female. The lady bird continued to shape the nest 

 with her breast, turning around and around, as if swinging on a central pivot, 

 just her beak and tail showing above the rim. If I came too near, she stood up in 

 the nest as if to fly. If I withdrew to a respectful distance, say three yards, she 

 went on with her work of shaping the nest. On the second day the rim of the nest 

 seemed about completed. It was narrower than the rest of the cup and beauti- 

 fully turned. Nothing to speak of had been done to the bottom. On the fourth 

 day, by touching the inside of the nest with the tips of my fingers, I judged that 

 the lining was about finished. It consisted of rabbit-hair and horse-hair, felted 

 or woven together so as to be very thick and firm. Between the foundation of 

 twigs and bark and the hair lining was a layer of fine hay of which the mouth of 



