NESTING HABITS OF OHUPENbULA — CHAPMAN 355 



contiuuoU til liaii^ around lor lu'url.v a wwk Inn liually yavt' up and loft 

 eutirefy. Lcgutux is still liauginy amund (May 11) as inollVctual as I'ver. 

 Cacivun makes rare visits to the abandonoil etdoiiy but the oropeudolas 

 {ZarhynvhuH) almost uever. 



Ill Jul}', 19:28, Mr. Zetok rt-porti'd to nu' tlio presence of 11 oropen- 

 dolii nests in a lar«j;e oiit>(an(liM<^ tree near the observatory on tlie 

 siinnnit of the ishiiuh These nests hail not hcen hiiilt when I h-ft the 

 island on Ajjiil i2, nor were the birds known to nest in these trees at 

 any previous time. Mr. Jay A. Weber, who was on Barro C(d<jrado 

 from July 22 to August 10, li)28, at my request, made repeated ob- 

 servations of these nests and he reports that no oro[)endolas were seen 

 near them or iiuleed on the islaml (hirin<.^ his stay. 



Possibly these nests were biiih in April before the rainy season 

 began, by the birds that had been prevented from nesting in the 

 sand-box tree at the laboratory. On the other hand, taken in con- 

 nection with Dr. Van Tyne's observations, recorded above, this late 

 building may imlicate a regular attemi)t at the production of a 

 second brood. 



VOICE 



The notes of Zarhijnchus are loud, varied and frequently uttered. 

 Those uttered by both sexes are (1) the characteristic blackbird 

 ''chuck" or "chut," which is apparently a location call or conversa- 

 tional note, and its varying tone doubtless conveys varjung mean- 

 ings; (2) a " cack-cack " development of the call note which ex- 

 presses suspicion and alarm. This is given by the male more fre- 

 quently than by the female whose voice joins that of the male in the 

 presence of actual or suspected danger, as described beyond. The 

 call is then louder, uttered more rapidly and resembles the sound 

 produced by a small watchman's rattle, or "matraca"; (3) a whin- 

 ing call which seems to be a note of combat, real or threatened. 

 This is given by tiie males when two or more at close quarters are 

 courting the same female, and by the females when in the contest for 

 a nest site the}' grapple and whirl downwards. The females also 

 sometimes whine just after entering the nest, but the significance 

 of the note is then not apparent. 



The notes peculiar to each sex are the female's gasping '' wee- 

 chuck-chuck-chuck," a low husky gurgle which one bird addresses to 

 another in disputes over the nesting site, and the male's announce- 

 ment of presence and his song. I distinguish between these two 

 calls of the male, but lack of experience with tlie species in the non- 

 breeding season makes the distinction an arbitrary one. 



I at once confess my inability to transcribe the male's calls either 

 by notation or syllabification, and faitli in my ])ower to convey even 

 an approximate idea of them is weakened by the fact that, for the 



