CHERRIE: ORNITHOLOGY OF THE ORINOCO REGION. I45 



for eggs I watched the parents for some time and noted them fre- 

 quently entering and leaving the new nest but not approaching the 

 old one in which were the eggs. While I was taking the clutch of 

 eggs on April 17th the parent birds remained close by but seemed to 

 take little notice of my presence. 



A nest which together with a set of four eggs and the parent birds 

 was taken at Caicara May 5th, 1907 (No. 14,655 Geo. K. Cherrie 

 Coll.) was a nest of Pitangus sulphuratus rufipennis that, having served 

 as a home for a brood of its builders' young, had been abandoned by 

 that builder and appropriated by a Cactus Wren. A new lining of 

 coarse dry grasses only had been taken in. The nest was located at 

 the extreme end of a long horizontal branch of a Guaramal tree and 

 was about 2.4 m. above the ground. The parent birds, both 

 of which were collected, were not at all demonstrative. The female 

 was shot as she left the nest. The ground color of the eggs varies 

 from a salmon-bufT to a vinaceous-cinnamon. They are everywhere 

 thickly speckled with hazel and chestnut. Of the four eggs, one was 

 on the point of hatching, one about half incubated, one fresh, the 

 fourth rotten and pierced with two small holes on the larger end. 

 They measure 24x17.5; 23x17.5; 23.5 X17.75 and 24.5x16.5 mm. 

 respectively. Three are ovate in form and one decidedly elongate 

 ovate. 



On the 22nd of May, 1907, near La Cascabel on the River San 

 Feliz, a nest was found containing two half grown young and one 

 rotten tgg. The nest was undoubtedly one that had been built by a 

 Pitangus. It was about 4.5 m. from the ground. The egg is ovate 

 in form and measures 25 x 18 mm. In color the ground is nearly a 

 salmon-buff and is thickly speckled with vinaceous-cinnamon. Mr. 

 Hartert in describing the eggs sent by the writer to the Tring 

 Museum refers to them as "glossy," but that term would hardly be 

 applicable to the examples that are before me. 



Heleodytes MINOR Cabanis.^ 



Heleodytcs minor Cab., Mus. Hein. I. 185 1. p. 80. 



This species was collected at Ciudad Bolivar by Klages, and the 



iln the American Museum collection is a series of specimens from the Santa Marta region, Colombia, 

 identified by Allen as //. grziCMS (Swains)— Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., XIII. 1900. p. 180— that seem to 

 belong to this species, but doubtless represent a different race that differs from the Venezuelan birds by the 

 almost total lack of barring to the tail-feathers (being faintly indicated in three or four only), and in the 

 greater extent and deeper shade of chestnut red on the back, rump, and wing-quill edges. 



