BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHER 353 



is considered an entirely beneficial species. A. H. Howell (1924) 

 quoted the findings of Judd's analyses of stomach contents and cited 

 particularly "longicorn beetles, jointworm flies, caddis-flies and several 

 * * * unidentified Diptera." He stated also that the gnatcatcher 

 had been seen in Alabama "feeding on cotton leaf worms." E. H. 

 Forbush (1929) added to this, "locusts * * * gnats, * * * 

 ants and other hymenoptera, wood-boring beetles, weevils and 

 spiders." A. A. Allen (1929) summed up many important items of 

 the gnatcatcher 's diet under the comprehensive term, "defoliating 

 insects." It is not unlikely that a stomach analysis of Florida and 

 Texas specimens taken in the citrus groves, one of the favorite haunts 

 of this species, would disclose the presence of some of the citrus pests. 



Winter food of the birds that remain within our borders probably 

 consists largely of insect eggs and pupae, the known prey of the 

 chickadees and kinglets with which the gnatcatcher associates at 

 that season. 



Food- table offerings seem seldom to attract this species; in fact, I 

 am able to find but a single instance of it, and that in winter. Mrs. 

 Andrew L. Whigham, who maintains an all-year feeding station in 

 her garden in extreme western Florida, writes (MS.): "In January 

 and February, 1933, for six or eight weeks, two of these birds used 

 our feed shelves. They ate the inevitable cornbread [a saltless recipe 

 of Mrs. Whigham's, baked in quantity for the birds and proven to 

 be as attractive to most species as cracked sunflower seeds] and the 

 commercial mockingbird food mixed with grated carrot." 



Behavior. — The gnatcatcher is a little bird of intense activity; 

 active, not with the methodical continuity of the brown creeper, but 

 with an irrepressible vivacity of its own in all phases of its life cycle — 

 feeding, nesting, care of its young — at all tmes, in fact, except during 

 the enforced inertia of incubation. 



In defense of its nest, the gnatcatcher's small size places it at a dis- 

 advantage in competition with larger species, for it seems not to possess 

 the "driving power" of the even smaller hummingbirds, though it 

 lacks nothing in either bravery or initiative when occasion demands 

 (see section "Enemies" for a special case of nest robbery by blue 

 jays). Its attitude toward human invasion of the sacred precinct of 

 the nest shows wide individual variation. On the few occasions when 

 I have approached closely to a gnatcatcher's nest, my presence always 

 caused great excitement, which was evidenced by noisy protests but 

 never resulted in a direct attack. S. A. Grimes (1928) found the 

 brooding gnatcatcher very tame, and on several occasions he "climbed 

 to within five or six feet of a sitting bird without causing it to leave the 

 nest, or when it did it usually returned before I could get the camera 

 set up for photographing." In sharp contrast to this, the same 



