BULLOCK'S ORIOLE 271 



with horsehair and the down of plants, wool, and fine moss, furnish the inner 

 lining of the nests. According to my observations, the birch, alder, cottonwood, 

 eucalyptus, willow, sycamore, oak, pine, and juniper furnish the favorite nesting 

 sites; and in southern Arizona and western Texas it builds frequently in bunches 

 of mistletoe growing on cottonwood and mesquite trees. 



The nests are usually placed in low situations, from 6 to 15 feet from the 

 ground, but occasionally one is found fully 50 feet up. A very handsome nest, 

 now before me, * * * is placed among six twigs of mistletoe, several of these 

 being incorporated in the sides of the nest, which is woven entirely of horsehair 

 and white cotton thread, making a very pretty combination. The bottom of 

 the nest is lined with wool. Outwardly it is 6 inches deep; inside 4% inches. 

 The entrance, at the top, is oval in shape, somewhat contracted, and 4 by 2% 

 inches wide. Another peculiar specimen before me, taken near Yreka, California, 

 May 29, 1860, is woven among and fastened to a bunch of needles of the long- 

 leafed pine; this nest resembles an inverted cone, and is quite unique in structure. 

 I have also seen double nests, one placed beside and fastened to one previously 

 built that had for some unknown reason been abandoned. 



In the vicinity of Fort Lapwai, Idaho, it was especially abundant, and, although 

 suitable nesting sites were by no means scarce, I have seen three occupied nests 

 of this Oriole in a small birch tree close to a nest of the Arkansas Flycatcher, 

 showing them to be very sociable birds. Near Camp Harney, Oregon, a Swainson's 

 Hawk, an Arkansas Flycatcher, and a pair of this species nested in the same tree, 

 a good-sized pine. A. K. Fisher tells me that he saw hundreds of these nests in 

 a large row of cottonwoods, east of Phoenix, Arizona, in June, 1892. 



In Arizona, Herbert Brandt (MS.) found this oriole often nesting 

 close to an occupied nest of the western kingbird, in the mesquite 

 chaparral. "At one place in a sycamore I saw them nesting within 

 three feet of each other, and they could have used, if they wished, 

 opposite sides of the tree, 30 feet apart. Twice they resided in the 

 same small mesquite." In Texas, he noted a similar association 

 between Bullock's oriole and the scissor-tailed flycatcher. 



Near the Huachuca Mountains, Ariz., we took a set of eggs of this 

 oriole, about 10 feet up in a sycamore, and a set of eggs of the western 

 flycatcher, about 20 feet from the ground in the same tree. 



On May 24, 1923, near Brownsville, Tex., I collected a set of five 

 fresh eggs from a typical nest of Bullock's oriole about 15 feet up in 

 a large mesquite; R. D. Camp told me that this species does not breed 

 there, but, after watching for a long time, I plainly saw both birds 

 go to the nest It is evidently not a common breeding bird there. 



C. S. Sharp (1903) has published an interesting paper, illustrated 

 with photographs, describing three distinct types of Bullocks' orioles' 

 nests, one of which is wholly pensile, one semipensile, and one not at 

 all pensile; his description of an especially beautiful pensile nest 

 follows: 



The twigs to which it was attached formed a fork, and a few inches above, 

 another small twig extended downward in the same direction. The nest was 

 wholly suspended from these, the twigs, with some of the leaves attached being 

 worked into it for a little distance down the sides and back. With these excep- 



