306 BULLETIN 17 6, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



a large flock in Nychow Harbor, Hainan, apparently on March 19. 

 T. H. Shaw (1936), writing on Hopei Province, says that it is a regu- 

 lar migrant to the plains, arriving in April. R. E. Vaughan and 

 K. H. Jones (1913) record the first arrival on March 26, but most 

 come in April. In the Japanese Islands specimens in the British 

 Museum collection were obtained at Nagasaki on March 18 and May 

 30 by P. Ringer, and from "Japan" in May (Hume collection). In 

 Sakhalin, L. Munsterhjelm (1922) records the date of first arrival as 

 June 4, when three birds were seen. 



C. Ingram (1908) saw one near Kioto, Japan, on May 4 and 

 several at Lake Kawaguchi on May 23. Blakiston and Pryer (1878) 

 also record it as present in May. The late Alan Owston noticed the 

 date of first arrival in Japan for two consecutive seasons on May 15. 

 In Siberia it is recorded as arriving in the second half of May; at 

 Darasun in Dauria it was first noted on May 24 by Dybowski, but 

 Przewalski records its arrival in southeast Mongolia on April 12, 

 1872, a very early date. 



Nesting. — ^Accounts of the nesting of this species differ very con- 

 siderably, and there is no doubt that the species adapts its habits to its 

 surroundings. R. Swinhoe's (1860) statement that these swifts were 

 breeding among the huts of a coastal village on Lamyit Island in the 

 Formosa Channel receives some confirmation from the accounts of 

 nesting in Siberia, but it does not seem to have been authenticated on 

 the spot. At Chefoo (Shantung Province), however, he (1874) ob- 

 tained a dozen birds, caught on the nests on June 22 by his collector, 

 on a small rocky islet about 15 miles out to sea. Here the swifts were 

 breeding in numbers in crannies of the rocks, and out of the 12 birds 

 captured 5 were males and 7 were females, showing that both sexes 

 take part in incubation. A nest of the year was like a shallow saucer, 

 nearly 4 inches broad, thicker behind than in front, and constructed 

 of refuse straw and a few bits of catkins and feathers, all agglutinated 

 with the bird's saliva. In another case, six nests had been built in 

 successive years on top of one another and strongly glued together. 

 From the same coast, off the Shantung littoral, we have an excellent 

 account of a breeding colony by Capt. H. L. Cochrane (1914) near 

 Wei-Hai-Wei. After stating that one breeding colony on a rocky islet 

 had been destroyed by an army of hungry rats, he adds : 



Nevertheless, it was a considerable surprise to find a small colony of Micropus 

 pacificus established on an unpretentious rock of the most modest dimensions, 

 both in length and height. This particular rock, much broken up, some 50 yards 

 long, and at its highest point 39 feet high, is situated 1400 yards from the 

 mainland, and 400 yards from a respectably sized island, which latter is un- 

 tenanted by Swifts of any description. Of limestone foundation, the rock is 

 seamed with deep fissures and long narrow crannies, and it is in these recesses 

 that the White-rumped Swift was found breeding in such elevated situations 



