CALLIOPE HUMMINGBIRD 423 



fluttered and swung head downward on her perch. The male alighted above 

 her, with vibrating wings, and coition tooli place in this position. 



Nesting. — Major Bendire (1895) gives an interesting account of the 

 nesting of the calliope hummingbird near Fort Klamath, Oreg., 

 where he said that this species outnumbered the common rufous hum- 

 mingbird about three to one. His first nest was found by the actions 

 of the bird ; he writes : 



I had taken quite a long walk along the banks of Fort Creek on June 10, and, 

 the day being a hot one, sat down with my back resting against the trunk of a 

 bushy black pine whose lower limbs had been killed by fire ; while resting thus 

 one of these Hummers buzzed repeatedly about my head for a few seconds at a 

 time, and then rose perpendicularly in the air, only to repeat the performance 

 again. I had no idea then that this species nested in pines, but in order to 

 give me an opportunity to watch its performance better I moved out from under 

 the tree, and a few minutes later saw the bird settle on what I at first supposed 

 to be an old clump of pine cones. On looking closer, however, I noticed its nest, 

 which was ingeniously saddled on two small cones, and its outward appearance 

 resembled a cone very closely. * * * Knowing now where to look for them, 

 I had no further difficulty in finding their nests, and all of those observed by 

 me were built in exactly similar situations. * * * They were usually placed 

 on or against a dry cone on small dead limbs of Pinus contorta, from 8 to 15 

 feet from the ground, and on account of the brittle nature of these limbs they 

 were rather hard to secure. The nests, while outwardly not as handsome as 

 those of the majority of our Hummers, are nevertheless marvels of ingenuity, all 

 those I have seen mimicking a small dead pine cone so perfectly as to almost 

 defy detection unless one sees the bird fly on or off the nest. The majority 

 found were saddled on one or two such cones, or on a small limb and resting 

 against the sides of a cone. The outer walls are composed of bits of bark and 

 small shreds of cone, and the inner cup is softly lined with willow down. An 

 average nest measures about 1^4 inches in outer diameter by the same in depth; 

 the inner cup being three-quarters of an inch in width by one-half inch in 

 depth. The nests were generally so placed that the contents were protected by 

 larger limbs or green boughs above. 



He says of another nest : "This is composed interiorly of fine moss 

 and willow down, and the outer walls are decorated with tiny shreds 

 of bark, fine flakes of wood, and flakes of whitewash, fastened securely 

 with cobwebs; it was placed on a knot in a rope hanging from the 

 roof of a woodshed and within 5 feet of an occupied dwelling house. 

 The materials out of which the nest is composed closely assimilate the 

 rope and knot on which it is placed." 



It seems to be the prevailing custom of this hummingbird to build 

 its nest on a small branch or twig directly under a larger branch, or 

 under a canopy of foliage, which serves to protect or conceal the nest 

 from overhead ; many observers have noticed this, and numerous pho- 

 tographs illustrate this type of location. This hummer has also de- 

 veloped to a high degree its skill in so placing its nest and so artfully 

 camouflaging it that it fades into the picture as a natural part of its 

 environment. James B. Dixon says in his notes that in the shaded 



