330 THE BIRDS OF MAINE 



outside by four internally, seven in diameter externally by 

 three internally. 



Three to five, usually four eggs are laid, these are grayish 

 colored, spotted and blotched with brown, slate and lavender. 

 Major Bendire gives the average measurements as 1.16 x 0.82. 

 Lumbermen have repeatedly told me of finding the nests in 

 March, usually noting a number of twigs on the surface of 

 the snow and on looking up to see where they had fallen from 

 would discover the nest in a fir or spruce tree at no great 

 height. The bird was usually on the nest and was reported 

 to me as sitting very closely so that it had to be removed by 

 hand. While resident the species is semi-roving in nature, not 

 always being found in the same regions for successive years. 



Subfamily CORVINE. Crows. 

 Genus COR V US Linnaeus. 



4i86a. Corvus corax principalis Ridgw. Northern Raven. 



Plumage: pure glossy black with steel blue reflections; throat feathers 

 narrow and pointed. Wing 17.00 ; culmen 3.00 ; tarsus 2.80. 



Geog. Dist. — Northern North America, south to Maine, North Carolina, 

 Michigan and British Columbia. 



County Records. — Aroostook ; rare at Houlton, (Batchelder, B. N. 0. C. 7. 

 p. 149) ; rare in the Woolastook Valley, (Knight). Cumberland; very rare 

 winter visitor, (Brown, C. B. P. p. 17) ; seen at Little Park Island, Harpswell, 

 Oct. 5, 1889, (Norton). Franklin; rare or accidental, (Richards). Hancock; 

 resident, a few nest annually on the outer islands, (Knight). Knox; resi- 

 dent, (Rackliff). Lincoln; seen in June, 1897, (Norton). Oxford; visitant; 

 (Nash). Penobscot; (Hardy). Sagadahoc; common, nests, (Spinney). 

 Somerset; one shot at Pittsfield, November, 1897, (Morrell). Waldo; nest- 

 ing occasionally, (Knight). Washington; not common, (Boardman) ; nest 

 near Lubec, April 14, 1905, (Clark). 



The raven is a bird of the coast in this State, except that 

 it also seems to occur regularly in Aroostook County, elsewhere 

 seeming to be only a straggler. They are rather rare residents 

 and scattered along the entire coast. 



A nest found April 14, 1900, on an island in East Penobscot 

 Bay, was a large bulky structure composed of sticks, roots 



