600 BULLETIN 2 3, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



thirteen years later, Mr. Potter (1935) established the chat as a breed- 

 ing bird in that vicinity by finding a nest with eggs. 



The western yellow-breasted chat, as it is now called, has evidently 

 permanently extended its breeding range slightly north of the inter- 

 national boundary in southwestern Saskatchewan. J. Dewey Soper 

 (1942) writes: 



From June 15 to 18, 1941, I camped at the Frenchman River about 200 yards 

 from the International Boundary. The valley here is several miles wide and 

 between 300 and 400 feet deep, the bottom of which is approximately 2,500 feet 

 a. s. 1. It exhibits pronounced arid characteristics such as sparse, short-grass 

 cover, an abundance of cacti, broad sagebrush and greasewood flats, rattlesnakes, 

 horned lizards, etc. A few miles up the valley are several towns of the Black- 

 tailed Prairie Dog. The river is bordered by rather extensive and very dense 

 thickets of willows, buckthorn, green ash, wild rose, snowberry, gooseberry and 

 sagebrush. Zonal conditions lean conspicuously to the Upper Sonoran. 



No sooner was the locality entered than Long-tailed Chats were heard on every 

 hand. This was at once recognized as an unusual experience. As the bottomland 

 thickets were carefully explored in the days that followed, it was increasingly 

 realized that longicauda was not only common, but actually abundant. * * * 

 I hesitate to express an opinion as to the number of chats in the neighborhood, but 

 they may have totaled between fifty and one hundred. If the former figure should 

 approximately apply (which strikes me as very conservative), then the average 

 would have been about one pair to every 140 yards. 



In the Great Basin region, in Nevada, according to Dr. Jean M. 

 Linsdale (1938), "The large, dense thickets of buffalo berry, inter- 

 twined with willow and rose provided satisfactory home sites for 

 this bird; in Smoky Valley in favorable stretches of a mile 3 or 4 

 pairs could be detected. Year after year noises made by this bird came 

 from exactly the same spots. Either these were more suitable than 

 other spots which appeared to be similar, or the birds exhibited an 

 especially strong tendency to return to the same bushes." 



In the Lassen Peak region of California, Grinnell, Dixon, and Lins- 

 dale (1930) say that "chats were limited closely to the tangles of tall 

 weeds, brush (willow, rose, blackberry, elder) and grapevines that 

 bordered the lower stream-courses." 



Nesting. — The western chat does not seem to differ materially from 

 its eastern relative in its nesting habits, or in any of its other habits. 



The nests are usually not over 2 or 3 feet from the ground in thickets 

 of willows, wild rose bushes, or other shrubs, often overgrown with 

 grapevines or other tangles. Grinnell, Dixon, and Linsdale (1930) 

 record one that "was slightly over two meters above the ground in a 

 vine that covered a dead tree. A large Cottonwood close by furnished 

 shade. The site was about on a level with the top of the undergrowth 

 of willows, weeds, and elders." 



Eggs. — The eggs are indistinguishable from those of the eastern 

 chat. The measurements of 50 eggs average 21.8 by 16.6 millimeters; 



