342 BULLETIN 19 6, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



cannot distinguish even with the aid of a lens, any trace of spots. The 

 eggs measure 20.5 by 14.2; 20.9 by 14.8; 20.9 by 14.2; 21 by 14.2; 

 21 by 14.4; 21.4 by 14.2 millimeters." 



According to Dresser (1902), L. ochotensis lays five or six eggs, which 

 are pale rose-colored, unspotted, but marked with one or two fine 

 blackish lines at the larger end, which sometimes form a wreath. 

 Yamashina states that the eggs of L. o. pleskei have a grayish-white 

 ground color with a violet tone, and that as regards the spotting there 

 are two types: (1) with rather large scattered spots and short lines of 

 a violet-blackish and gray color, and (2) with the violet-brownish and 

 pale purple spots so close that they almost cover the ground. He adds 

 that about two or three of type 1 are found to one of type 2. The dif- 

 ference in the two descriptions is sufficient to raise the question whether 

 the eggs Dresser described were rightly identified, unless, indeed, 

 pleskei is really a different species, as some have held. Moreover, 

 Yamashina states that the nests of pleskei always contain four eggs. 

 He gives the season of laying as from mid-May to mid-June. Hartert 

 and Steinbacher (1938) give the average egg measurement for ocho- 

 tensis as 19.44 by 14.7 and for pleskei as 20.96 by 15.47 millimeters. 

 Yamashina gives the maxima for pleskei as 23 by 15.5 and 20.7 by 16.2 

 millimeters and minimum 19.5 by 15 millimeters. 



Food. — Like others of its kind the species is insectivorous. Yama- 

 shina examined the stomach contents of 12 individuals of pleskei, 

 which all contained the remains of Coleoptera. Three contained also 

 the remains of small Hymenoptera, two small fruits, one larvae of 

 Diptera and Geometridae, and one small snails. 



Young.' — The female incubates (Yamashina). No other details are 

 available. 



Plumage. — The plumage is described by Hartert (1910). The differ- 

 ences between the races ochotensis and pleskei are mentioned above. 



Behavior. — Sten Bergman (1935), freely translated from the Ger- 

 man, says of the habitat in the far north: t( Locustella ochotensis, one 

 of the characteristic birds of Kamchatka, arrives rather late in spring, 

 never before June. In 1921 I saw the first individual on June 9 near 

 Klutschi, and the last on September 5 near Ust-Kamchatka. 



"The bird does not frequent the larch or coniferous forests or, cus- 

 tomarily, the dry birch woods, but occurs in the meadows, swamps, and 

 along the brooks, and, confining itself to the undergrowth, is seldom or 

 never found in the high trees. It is a typical bird of the lower slopes 

 of the mountains among the alder scrub, and does not, like Luscinia 

 calliope camtschatkensis, ascend to the higher elevations." 



Leonhard Stejneger (1883), writing to Professor Baird, gives a 

 glimpse of this elusive, little known bird, breeding in a far-away 

 corner of the world, and of the difficulty in collecting specimens. 



