TITMICE. 29 



from Texas into the British possessions, specimens having been 

 received from Fort Simpson and Lake Winnipeg. Among the 

 notes of the late Robert Kennicott is one dated Lake Winnipeg, 

 June 6, mentioning the dissection of a female of this species found 

 to contain a full-sized egg. A memorandum made by Mr. Ross> 

 dated at Fort William, May 15, speaks of this bird as abundant 

 at Fort Simpson, from August until November, the last having been 

 seen November 10. One was shot, June 2, on Winnipeg River, 

 *a female,' vi^ho was about to lay her egg." *•■•* 



It is the largest of this genus in America. In its breeding 

 habits it is not different from the Eastern representatives. Mr, 

 B. F. Goss found this species breeding abundantly at Neosho Falls, 

 in Kansas. They nest in decayed stumps, hollow trees, branches, 

 logs, etc., after the manner of the atricapillus. The excavation is 

 usually ten or twelve inches, and even more, in depth. The nest 

 is warmly made of a loose soft felt composed of the fur and fine 

 hair of small quadrupeds, feathers, and the finer mosses. The 

 eggs, usually five, occasionally eight, in number, are of a rounded 

 oval shape, measuring .60 by .50 of an inch. They have a pure 

 dull-white ground, and the entire egg is very uniformly and pretty 

 thickly covered with fine markings and small blotches of red and 

 reddish-brown intermingled with a few dots of purplish." — Baird, 

 Brewer and Ridgway's N. A. Birds, vol. i, pp. 100, loi. 



4i<5. parus atricapillus occidentalis. 

 OREGON CHICKADEE. - 



42. parus carolinensis. 

 CAROLINA CHICKADEE. 



** South of the once famous line of Mason and Dixon this small- 

 er counterpart of the Chickadee seems to entirely replace it, al- 

 though in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and occasionally even 

 as far to the north as New York City, the two occur together. Its 

 range is presumed to be all the States South of the Potomac and 

 the Ohio, as far to the west as the Rio Grande."*"** Without much 

 doubt it breeds in all the States south of Pennsylvania. ■*"*••• Ac- 

 cording to the observations of the late Dr. Alexander Gerhardt of 

 Whitfield County, Georgia, these birds usually breed in holes that 



