SCISSOR-TAILED FLYCATCHER 85 



Eggs. — The scissor-tailed ^catcher lays four to six eggs, most 

 commonly five, one egg being laid each day until the set is complete. 

 They are ovate and only slightly glossy. The ground color is clear 

 white, or creamy white, and rarely slightly pinkish white. They 

 are more or less spotted or blotched with dark browns, dark "chest- 

 nut brown," "seal brown," or "claret brown," with underlying mark- 

 ings of "heliotrope gray" or shades of "Quaker drab" or "brownish 

 drab." Some eggs are very lightly marked, and some are nearly 

 immaculate. The measurements of 50 eggs average 22.5 by 17.0 

 millimeters; the eggs showing the four extremes measure 24.1 by 

 17.8, 23.1 by 19.5, and 20.3 by 15.5 millimeters. 



Young. — Incubation is said to last for 12 or 13 days. Bendire 

 (1895) says: "Incubation lasts about twelve days, and the female 

 appears to perform this duty alone, while the male remains in the 

 vicinity, and promptly chases away every suspicious intruder w^io 

 may venture too close to the nest. The young are fed exclusively 

 on an insect diet, and are able to leave the nest in about two weeks. 

 Both parents assist in their care. In the late summer they congre- 

 gate in considerable numbers in the cotton fields and open prairies 

 preparatory to their migration south." 



Phumages. — The only nestling that I have seen is fully feathered 

 with the remiges and rectrices about half out of their sheaths, and 

 the whole plumage is soft and fluffy; the soft feathers of the uppei 

 parts are dull white, more or less tipped with pale drab on the head 

 and upper back; those of the lower back and rump are tipped for 

 half their length or more with darker drab, darkest and most exten- 

 sive on the rump and upper tail coverts ; the under parts are immacu- 

 late, dull white, but are washed with pale drab on the upper breast. 

 This plumage is probably not fully developed; when these feathers 

 are fully grown, perhaps before the bird would leave the nest, their 

 white bases would probably be more fully concealed. 



Ridgway (1907) describes a young bird, which is evidently in full 

 Juvenal plumage, as "somewhat like the paler or duller colored 

 females, but gray of upper parts decidedly brownish (pale drab- 

 gray), the crown darker, and without trace of concealed spot; sides, 

 flanks, abdomen, and under tail-coverts uniform, very pale cream- 

 buff ; no orange axillary patch." 



I have seen birds in this plumage, in which the outer primary 

 is entire, not attentuated as in the adult, as late as December and 

 even January. But, apparently, the postjuvenal molt begins in 

 October, or earlier, and may continue well into January. This molt 

 produces the first winter plumage, which is more like that of the 

 adult, with the outer primary sharply attenuated at the tip, but the 

 back is somewhat browner, the pink on the flanks is duller, and 



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