82 



THE OOLOGIST 



Antonio, Texas, this spring. This is 

 the largest set of which we have any 

 knowledge. 



Bobolink. 



Dolychonyx Oryzivorus, also called in 



the Southern States, Reed- or 



Rice-bird. 



Of all our natural songsters the 

 Bobolink is the most noted and popu- 

 lar. Descriptions of his songs so fre- 

 quently appear in literature, that even 

 those who have not heard it, must 

 form a good idea of its enchanting 

 music. 

 "That rollicking jubilant whistle, 



That rolls like a brooklet along — 

 That sweet flageolet of the meadows. 



The bubbling Bobolink song." 



The Bobolink is too well known to 

 need description. — They enter the 

 Southern States the last of March or 

 the first of April and by the middle 

 of May have reached their summer 

 homes in our immediate vicinity. 



When the Bobolink comes to us in 

 May he is wearing his bridal dress of 

 black and buff, and very attractive it 

 is. His mate or wife is quite differ- 

 ently attired in a streaked sparrow 

 like costume. After family cares are 

 over, in common with all birds, both 

 Bobolink and his wife, shed their now 

 worn plumage and an entire new one 

 is grown, and the male looks very 

 much like the female. The bright col- 

 ors have disappeared. 



The nest of the Bobolink is exceed- 

 ingly difficult to find. It is built in a 

 natural cavity of the ground, among 

 the tall grasses of a meadow. We had 

 seen several male Bobolinks on this 

 side of Stony Point, on the then called 

 Tifft farm. Being provided with a 

 long rope of 60 feet or more, we tied 

 the ends to the lower part of our leg 

 and trailed, keeping a sharp lookout 

 along the rope. Within twenty min- 

 utes we had found two nests. 



Several years later, near the Tona- 

 wanda Swamp, about fifty miles north- 

 east of Buffalo, N. Y., a friend of ours, 

 went a little ways from the farm-house 

 early in the morning, climbed on the 

 roof of a schoolhouse, and silently 

 watched when the male Bobolink flew 

 to the nest, we supposed to bring food 

 to his mate. He located the place and 

 found easily from four to six nests. 



They lay from five to seven eggs, 

 and queer to say, each set is different- 

 ly colored and marked, no two sets 

 alike. 



After raising their brood they gath- 

 er in flocks and return to the South- 

 ern States and are found in immense 

 numbers in the rice-fields and marshes, 

 and are trapped and cauglit in large 

 quantities, to be sent to the Hotels 

 in Washington, where they are serv- 

 ed as Rice- or Reed-Birds. If the Bob- 

 olink would not be well protected in 

 our Northern States, they would have 

 been exterminated long ago. To my 

 knowledge they have increased in this 

 locality. 



From the rice-fields they migrate to 

 South America and have been observ- 

 ed south of the Amazon River where 

 they again drape themselves in bridal- 

 dress for their return to the United 

 States where the 



Bobolink has come, and like the soul 

 of a sweet season, vocal in a bird, 

 gurgles in ecstacy we know not what. 

 Save June! Dear June! Now God be 

 praised for June. 



Ottomar Reinecke. 



Nesting of the Northern Pileated 

 Woodpecker. 



Of the various birds found in the 

 Pennsylvania forests, none possesses 

 the attraction for me that the Pileated 

 Woodpecker does. He is at once so 

 reserved, so lordly that his very pres- 

 ence lends an air of nobility to his sur- 

 roundings. 



