180 BULLETIN 19 7, UNITED STATES NATIONAL AiUSEUM 



Griffing Bancroft (1930) says of the haunts of Nelson's shrike: 

 "There are shrikes near Santa Kosalia. In any small canon which runs 

 back from the Gulf and which also contains a few trees, three or four, 

 perhaps a breeding pair, of these birds are apt to be found. They nest 

 near San Ignacio Lagoon and among the sand dunes along with the 

 Desert Thrasher. They occupy, intermittently, the terrain between 

 these extremes, but only in associations either of low brush or of iso- 

 lated trees. On the whole they are to be listed as rare birds." 



Nesting. — Bancroft says on this subject: "The breeding season is 

 well under way in March and does not extend beyond April. Either 

 three or four eggs are laid, in bulky nests of tree moss. There is no 

 lining in the cup. The building material, which is the same through- 

 out, is itself soft enough for the eggs." Dr. Miller (1931) says that, 

 of the three nests found by Mr. Bancroft, "one was in a Joshua tree, 

 one against a bank and covered with a creeping vine, and one in the 

 heart of a growth of tumble weed." There is a set of four eggs of this 

 shrike in the Charles E. Doe collection, at Gainesville, Fla., that was 

 taken by Mr. Bancroft at a later date, March 30, 1932, at Playa Maria, 

 Lower California. The nest was said to have been of "fine end tops 

 and moss," and located 3 feet from the ground in a frutilla bush. 



J. Stuart Rowley writes to me : "In the Cape region of Lower Cali- 

 fornia, I found this shrike not very abundant and exceedingly wary to 

 approach within gun range. One nest was located near Todos Santos 

 on May 22, 1933, containing four fresh eggs, which are smaller than 

 the average size of the northern races. The nest was very well con- 

 cealed in overhanging vine tangles, but was typically of shrike 

 construction." 



E^ggs. — The eggs of Nelson's shrike are apparently like those of other 

 races of this sjiecies. The measurements of 18 eggs average 24.9 by 

 18.3 millimeters; the eggs showing the four extremes measure 26.5 by 

 18.5, 26.0 by 19.5, and 22.8 by 17.1 millimeters. 



LANIUS LUDOVICIANUS ANTHONY! Mearns 

 ISLAND SHRIKE 



HABITS 



Two races of this species have been described from the Santa Barbara 

 Islands, off the coast of southern California, but only the above-named 

 form is recognized in the 1931 Check-list. Dr. Mearns (1898), in 

 naming this subspecies, remarks: "This Shrike is naturally to be com- 

 pared with Lanius ludovicmnus gartibeli Ividgway, the form common 

 on the adjacent coast of California, but differs in being very much 

 darker as well as smaller. It is, in fact, darker than the darkest eastern 

 specimens of L. ludovicianusy 



