SWALLOWS 



83 



sides of neck, light-grayish, tlie hindneck usually 

 crossed by a dull sooty-grayish band or collar, this 

 usually indistinct; chin, throut. chest, sides, and flanks, 

 sooty-gray; breast, abdomen, and under tail-coverts, 

 white or pale grayish, usually streaked, narrowly, with 

 dark sooty -gray. 



Nest and Eggs. — Nest : In boxes erected tor their 

 use, a few pair occasionally returning to primitive con- 

 ditions and nesting in hollow trees ; nesting material 

 consisting of nearly anytliing liandy — leaves, rags, 



paper, string, straw, or grass. Eggs : 4 to 6, pure 

 glossy-white, unmarked. 



Distribution. — Temperate North America, except 

 Pacific coast district ; breeding north to Mame, New 

 E^runswick, Nova Scotia, northwestern Ontario, Mani- 

 toba, Montana, and Idaho; breeding southward to 

 southern Florida, southern Texas, and plateau of 

 Mexico; in winter, from southern Florida and Mexico 

 to Venezuela and Brazil; accidental in Bermudas and 

 British Isles. 



Swallows are everywhere in good repute. (Jf 

 all the species the Purple Martin is undouhtedly 

 the most popular. Houses are erected for their 

 accommodation in all parts of the country. In 

 some sections of the south there scarcely can be 

 seen a negro's cabin but what has its Martin 

 box, or more often a number of gourds swung 

 from crossed strips erected on the top of a pole. 

 Like other Swallows, these birds nest in colonies 

 when accommodations are adequate ; thus a 

 dozen pairs will sometimes occupy as many 

 compartments of a bird-box. 



These friends of the Martins in the south do 

 not all provide homes for the birds from an 

 altruistic .standpoint, or for sentimental reasons. 

 Martins defend their nests with great tenacity, 

 and drive from the neighborhood any Crow or 

 Hawk that comes within sight ; they are, there- 

 fore, cherished as important guardians of the 

 ])oultry yard. 



Their nests are made of a miscellaneous col- 

 lection of sticks, wood-stems, feathers, grasses, 

 and mud. Before the settlement of the United 

 States by Europeans, the Indians of the South 

 encouraged the birds to come about their fields 

 by putting up gourds for their accommodation. 

 This, to be sure, was not practiced extensively 

 enough to provide homes for all the Martins of 

 the country ; furthermore we can readily imagine 

 a time of sufificient remoteness when no nesting 

 devices whatever were erected for their use. 

 The original nesting places of the Martin, there- 

 fore, were such as nature provided, and these 

 we know were the hollows of trees. So de- 

 pendent have the birds become on man's bountv, 

 that hollow trees are rarely used by them. In 

 the pine woods on the edge of the Everglades of 

 south Florida, I have found Martins breeding in 

 hollow trees, and not long ago I saw birds simi- 



larly engaged in a little grove on the border of 

 Devil's Lake. North Dakota. In some cities they 

 build in the holes of buildings, as for example 

 in Seattle ; in other places vmder the eaves of 

 buildings, as in Bismarck, North Dakota, and in 

 Plant City and Clearwater, Florida. 



T. Gilbert Pearson. 



In the Pacific Coast region south into Lower 

 California is found the Western Martin [Propne 

 suhis Itcspcria). The male is not distinguishable 

 from the male of the Purple Martin ; but the 

 female has the gray of the forehead extending 

 back into the crown, a conspicuous edge of 



Drawing by R. I. Ur.isliir 



PURPLE MARTIN 1 ', nat. size) 

 A beautiful and useful bird 



grayish-brown to the feathers of the back and 

 rump, and the under parts grayish-white an- 

 teriorly and immaculate white posteriorly. 



The Martins are ainong the most beneficial of 

 birds. Their food consists almost entirely of 

 insects — wasps, bugs, beetles, and flies. Among 

 the beetles are the boll-weevils, clover-leaf wee- 

 vils, and nut weevils. Locusts are eaten at all 

 stages. 



