GREEN-TAILED TOWHEE 553 



seen near the nest. By 9:20 a.m., May 30, incubation was under way; 

 it began, presumably, with the laying of the fourth and last egg, which 

 was not actually seen until the 31st, when Phillips deliberately flushed 

 the incubating bird from the nest. 



The greentail lays from two to five eggs. For 28 sets recorded in 

 the literature, the average size was 3.65 eggs, the distribution being as 

 follows: 3 sets of two, 7 sets of three, 15 sets of four, and 3 sets of five. 

 Egg weights of this species as recorded by W. C. Hanna (1924b) 

 average 2.91 grams (55 eggs), with extremes of 2.16 and 4.02 grams. 



W. G. F. Harris describes the eggs as follows: 



"Four eggs comprises the usual set of this species although 

 sometimes as few as three or as many as five are laid. They are 

 ovate to rounded ovate, and moderately glossy. The eggs are white, 

 profusely speckled, and finely spotted with such shades of reddish 

 brown as "snuff brown," "Rood's brown," "russet," or "avellaneous" 

 with undertones of "light mouse gray" and "pale mouse gray." The 

 majority of eggs are heavily speckled over the entire surface, and often 

 these markings are confluent at the large end forming a solid cap. 

 Some of the gray undertones and the brown spots are so close and 

 intermingled that they run together; others have the spots of the two 

 colors sharply defined and separated; on stiU others the gray under- 

 tones may be entirely lacking. The measiu-ements of 50 eggs average 

 21.8 by 16.4 millimeters; the eggs showing the four extremes measure 

 25.2X18.3, 18.8X15.2, and 19.6X^-4.^ miUimeters." 



Young. — We find no observations on the normal sequence of 

 hatching. However, the following remarks of R. W. Hendee (1929) 

 on hatchability under suboptimal conditions are worthy of note: 

 "On June 12 two nests were found * * *. The eggs from these sets 

 were carried to om' base camp and three days later when I unwrapped 

 them to blow them I found to my chagrin that one set was just 

 hatching, the young birds being still alive." The word "chagrin," 

 incidentally, reveals something of the observer's viewpoint, which 

 evidently was more that of the traditional oologist than that of the 

 avian biologist. In occasional nests the hatchability of eggs may be 

 low. In reporting on several nests found m the San Bernardino 

 Mountains, G. Willett (1921) says that "all contained young except 

 one found on June 15, which held three addled eggs." 



Hatching takes place from early June through July; fledglings leave 

 the nest from mid- June until August. Almost no information is 

 available on parental care or development of nestlings. Although 

 brooding has been recorded (Phillips, MS.), neither this nor feeding 

 of young, including the role of the sexes, appears to have been studied. 

 J. Grinnell (1908) mentions a nest holding four half -grown young 

 whose parents "showed mild soUcitude, by uttering their kitten-hke 



