74 U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 211 



song of the year was heard in February, the average date of the first 

 song being February 19. Regular singing, however, does not begin 

 until March, and in 6 years it did not begin until April. The average 

 date of its beginning is March 26. 



"I have less full data on the cessation of song, as I have frequently 

 been in places where I could not hear it at the proper season. Five 

 years in Cattaraugus County, N. Y., give an average of August 11 

 for the last song, whereas 5 years in Connecticut average August 18. 



"The song is revived in September or October, and is to be heard 

 quite frequently through the fall until November. In Connecticut 

 20 years of observations give an average of September 30 for the 

 beginning and November 13 for the end of the fall singing, but such 

 singing is much more erratic than spring singing. Songs in December 

 are rare, though more frequent than in January." 



Enemies. — In most sections of its lange the eastern meadowlark is 

 not commonly imposed upon by the cowbird. I have never found a 

 nest in New England that contained an egg of the cowbird, and 

 G. B. Saunders (MS., p. 56) states that of over 50 nests studied in 

 Oklahoma and New York, none contained other than meadowlark 

 eggs. However, during the course of a statistical survey of the birds 

 of Illinois in 1906-1908 I found four cases of cowbird parasitism: One 

 nest in northern Illinois near Rockford contained three eggs of the 

 meadowlark and one cowbird's egg; of two nests in Champaign 

 County, central Illinois, one contained two meadowlark and three 

 cowbird eggs and the other, three meadowlark and two cowbird eggs, 

 with a broken meadowlark's egg outside of the nest; and a nest near 

 Benton, Franklin County, in southern Illinois, contained two eggs of 

 the meadowlark and two young, one of which, judging from its size 

 and appearance, was a freshly hatched cowbird. 



G. Eifrig (1915, 1919) writing on the birds of the Chicago area 

 states that he has repeatedly found nests of the meadowlark with one 

 or more eggs of the cowbird. He also states that one or more or all 

 the eggs of the rightful owner were apparently rolled out. It would 

 seem that the meadowlark is a common victim of the cowbird in the 

 State of Illinois. Milton B. Trautman (1940) found two nests of the 

 meadowlark containing cowbirds eggs at Buckeye Lake, Ohio. Ben- 

 dire (1895) reports an instance where a second nest was built over one 

 containing the parasitic egg. This is a common habit of certain birds 

 such as the warblers but presumably it is rare in the case of the 

 meadowlark. Herbert Friedmann (1929) has obtained records of 

 cowbird parasitism of the eastern meadowlark from New England, 

 New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, and Iowa, but states 

 that the meadowlark is not a common host. 



