108 



THE OOLOQIST. 



Eagle nests about nine miles farther 

 on. We made him an offer for the 

 whole lot and he promised he would 

 go after them this week. If he gets 

 them I will give the readers of Oolo- 

 gist full details of his experience. I 

 have not given the exact location of 

 these Eagles nests because it might 

 excite the curiosity of some collectors 

 to such an extent that they might be 

 foolish enough to go over the same 

 ground and suffer the same exper- 

 ience as we did. 



E. .J. DARLINGTON, 



Wilmington, Del. 



Oological Freaks. 



Believing you have other i-eaders 

 of "The Oologist," who are, like my- 

 self, especially interested in oologi- 

 cal freaks and abnormals, I think the 

 following "finds^' this season will be 

 of interest to them: 



On May 16th, I found a Field Spar- 

 row's (A. O. U. .563) nest containing 

 two young about two days old, and 

 one egg measuring .46x.39. This egg 

 had the usual markings of eggs of 

 this species except that it is spotted 

 on the small end instead of the large 

 end. 



On .lune 20th, I found a nest of 

 Brown Thrasher (A. O. U. 705) con- 

 taining three fresh eggs and on re- 

 turning to it two days later it contain- 

 ed five eggs in the nest and one egg 

 on the outer rim. These are, with- 

 out doubt the eggs of two birds, as 

 two of them were darker and heavier 

 spotted than the others. Also two fe- 

 males and one male approached with 

 their usual actions when the eggs 

 were being taken. I have never se- 

 cured more than five eggs of this spe- 

 cies from one nest before. 



On June 21st I found a nest of In- 

 digo Bunting (A. O. U. 59S) contain- 

 ing six fresh eggs. Three of them 

 were partly covered by the lining of 

 the nest and the other three were 



placed in the nest, as usual. The 

 three lower eggs were probably aban- 

 doned and the parent bird, partly cov- 

 ering them with more grasses laid the 

 others. Would you call this one set 

 of six eggs or two sets of three? 



On June 22nd, I found a nest of 

 Yellow-breasted Chat (A. O. U. 683) 

 contained 3 lightly incubated eggs, 

 one of which was almost pure white, 

 having only three very faint spots of 

 brown, another well spotted, and the 

 other one sparingly spotted. This 

 clutch is a series in itself. 



On June 27th I found a nest of Blue- 

 bird (A. O. U. 766) containing four 

 lightly incubated, pure white eggs. Of 

 the many clutches of this species I 

 have examined, this is the first one 

 of pure white eggs I have ever found. 

 This nest was in an abandoned Red- 

 headed Woodpecker's hole, in a fence 

 post, about four feet from the ground. 

 In April of this year I found a clutch 

 of five badly incubated eggs of this 

 species in this hole, but left them to 

 hatch. 



W. L. GRIFFIN. 

 Ky. 



Suspended Nidificatibn. 



RICHARD C. HARLOW. 

 On July 26th, 1907, I discovered a 

 Goldfinch's nest which the female bad 

 just started to build in a small cotton- 

 wood. On account of the favorable 

 situation for observation the nest 

 building was closely watched, and 

 probably for this reason the nest was 

 apparently deserted when just about 

 completed. Several times within the 

 next two weeks I looked in the nest 

 but to all outward appearances it was 

 deserted. For some time then it was 

 not visited, and my surprise may 

 therefore be judged when on passing 

 the tree on August 31st, I beheld a 

 Goldfinch upon the nest. On inves- 

 tigation it was ascertained that it held 

 four incubated eggs which were al- 

 lowed to hatch. The eggs could not 

 have been laid earlier than August 

 20th and an interesting problem is 

 here presented. The nest was finish- 

 ed on July 30th and therefore a period 

 of 20 days elapsed between the com- 

 pletion of the nest and the laying of 

 the first egg. Who can enlighten us 

 on the subject? 



Edge Hill. Pa. 



