GROSBEAKS 367 



home. It is evident that cold weather and storms have nothing 

 to do with their presence in Maine, as they are often very few 

 in number during the most severe winters, while mild winters 

 sometimes they are present by hundreds. 



They occur everywhere throughout the State at seasons, in 

 flocks of two or three, more often ten or a dozen, to sometimes 

 flocks of a hundred or more. Though found in the southern 

 counties at variable dates, from sometimes as early as November 

 first to as late as the last of March or even as late as April 

 fifteenth, (Norton and Knight at Scarboro,) their more usual 

 time of occurrence is in the winter months. 



In northern Maine occasional individuals are seen throughout 

 the summer under conditions which indicate they are nesting, 

 but the species more generally occurs from November until 

 April in numbers. Mr. Brewster records a young male shot 

 at Upton, August 27, 1874, which is so early a date as to 

 indicate their breeding near there. The species has also been 

 observed by me in Somerset, northern Penobscot, Hancock, and 

 Aroostook Counties under circumstances that indicate their 

 breeding there. They have also been reported in the mountains 

 of Franklin County in summer. 



Fortunately we have very conclusive and definite information 

 to prove they do nest in Maine. Miss Marie Kaizer Maddox 

 of Ellsworth Falls, writes as follows:- "Four years ago in the 

 month of May I found a Pine Grosbeak's nest about seven 

 miles north of Jackman, near a sporting camp at Hale Pond. 

 The nest was not in thick woods but in open pasture near the 

 Canada Road. It was woven of twigs and moss, lined with 

 rabbit's hair and contained four pale-green eggs, flecked with 

 purple and hardly to be distinguished from the moss itself. 

 This nest was in a fir tree about four feet from the ground. 

 It was neatly woven but much less substantial than most nests 

 of that size. Probably the fact that the region is three thousand 

 feet above sea level accounts for a nest in that latitude. 



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