THS OOLOOIST 



151 



Strange to say, they were not very 

 noisy, and not many sounds escaped 

 the birds. It was only frequently 

 that a harsh squeak was heard. Nor 

 were they very timid, lighting high up 

 in the trees, at almost a stone's throw. 



J. W. Stierle. 

 Marshfield, Wisconsin. 



Frank I. Harris. 

 We are in receipt of a card from 

 Frank I. Harris of La Crescent, Min- 

 nesota, an oologist well known 

 throughout the country, advising us 

 that he had the misfortune to break 

 one of his legs and is now confined to 

 a hospital at La Crosse, Wis. We 

 trust he may be favored with an early 

 recovery. 



Notes on the Scissor-tailed Flycatcher. 



My seeing an article on the Scissor- 

 tailed Flycatcher in THE OOLOGIST 

 (Vol. XXVIII, No. 6, June, 1911) has 

 prompted this attempt to add further 

 notes to the data already acquired in 

 reference to this interesting bird. 



There is very little variance in the 

 dates of arrival at Houston, the birds 

 usually making their appearance about 

 .March 2::!d. 



Found breeding in the neighborhood 

 of ranch and farm houses in the 

 prairie districts, but never in wooded 

 localities or, to the best of my knowl- 

 edge, on the edges of woods or for- 

 ests. 



About the 2fith of April the birds be- 

 gin courting, and perform many queer 

 aerial gynmastics, which, to the casual 

 observer, would indicate that the bird 

 had gone crazy. The males dart at 

 each other angrily, sometimes as 

 many as four or five seemingly en- 

 tangled and rising straight up in the 

 air with a gyroscopic motion. 



The first nests are usually complet- 

 ed about May 10th, and the first egg 

 laid on the 11th; the first full sets of 

 eggs were found on the 17th and ISth, 



and the first young hatched on May 

 31st. There are rarely any variations 

 in these dates for the first brood from 

 year to year, but the second brood, 

 wherever one is raised, comes any 

 time in June and July. 



The nests are built in isolated hui- 

 saches on the prairie, in the occasion- 

 al oak "mottes," and in the trees 

 which grow around every house on the 

 prairie, planted there by the hand of 

 man. They are placed in the extremi- 

 ties of the branches and very diflicult 

 to reach, as low as six feet and as 

 high as thirty. They are composed of 

 weed-stems, small twigs and thistle 

 down, and lined with thistle down, 

 cotton or small fibrous rootlets. Some- 

 times the nests contain pieces of 

 string, newspaper, rags and other rub- 

 bish; all thrown together into a very 

 untidy structure. All the sets which 

 have come under my observation were 

 composed of four and five eggs, never 

 six. 



A nest found on June 21, 1911, on 

 the coastal prairie south of Houston, 

 was placed in the structure of a wind- 

 mill behind a ranch house. The nest 

 was under the gearing near the top 

 and within six inches of the flying 

 planes of the fan. This did not seem 

 to bother the bird at all. Nest com- 

 posed of twigs and clover stems, and 

 lined with a small quantity of cot- 

 ton; and contained four slightly in- 

 cubated eggs. 



The birds are very pugnacious when 

 the nest is reached, and quite often I 

 have felt their wings fan my face as 

 they flashed angrily about their pos- 

 sessions, all the while keeping up an 

 excited twittering. 



A set of four eggs measures: .870x 

 .073, .850 x. 6.53, .877 x .645, .870 x .653 

 inches. 



The annual molt takes place about 

 July and August, when the birds as- 

 semble in small flocks and wander 



