THE MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRD. 261 



wi.' li;i\c only iwo records of its occurrence cjii llie Pacific slope in W'asliing- 

 lon". The bird ranges up to liie higliest peaks of the central divide, but it is 

 not at all conmion in the mountains. It seems to prefer more open situations 

 and, so far from being exclusively boreal in its tastes, has been found nesting 

 at as low an altitude as Wallula, on the banks of the Columbia River. 



.\t Chelan in a typical season (1896) the migrations opened with the ap- 

 pearance, on the J4th day of February, of seven males of most perfect beauty. 

 They deployed upon the t(jwnsite in search of insects, and uttered plaintive 

 notes of Sialian quality, varied by dainty, thrush-like tsooks of alarm when too 

 closely pressed. They did not at an}' time attempt song, and the entire song 

 tradition, including the "delightful warble" of Townsend, appears to be cpiite 

 without foundation, as in the ca.se of S. 111. occidoitalis. On the 15th of March 

 a flock of fift\- Bluebirds, all males, were sighted flying in close order o\-er the 

 mountain-side, a vision of loveliness which was enhanced by the presence of a 

 dozen or more Westerns. Sexeral flocks were observed at this season in which 

 the two species mingled freely. On the 27th of the same month the last 

 great wave of migration was noted, and some two hundred birds, all ".\rctics" 

 now. and at least a third of them females, quartered theinselves upon us for a 

 da\-. — with what delighted appreciation upon our part may best be imagined. 

 The males are practically all azure ; but the females have a much more modest 

 garb of reddish gray, or stone-olive, which flashes into blue on wings and tail, 

 only as the bird flits from post to ])ost. 



In nesting. Mountain Bluebirds sometimes di.splay the same confidence 

 shown by the darker species; and their adoption into urban, or at least village 

 life, would seem to be only a matter of time. They are a gentle breed, and it 

 is an honor of which we may well stri\e to prove wortlu'. to be chosen as 

 hosts by these distinguished gentlefolk. 



"Cicntle." as a])])lied to lUucbirds. has alwaxs the older sense of noble. — 

 noble because brave. My attention was first called to a nest in the timbered 

 foothills of Yakima County, because its valiant owner furiously beset a Flicker 

 of twice his size, a clumsy villain who had lighted by mistake on the Bluebird's 

 nesting stub. The gallant defender did not use these tactics on the bird-man, 

 but his accents were sternly accusing as the man proceeded to investigate a 

 clean-cut hole eight feet up in a pine stub four feel thru. Five dainty eggs 

 of the palest possible blue rested at tlie bottom of the cavity on a soft cushion 

 of fine grasses. 



This must have been a typical structure, but near Chelan I found the birds 

 nesting at the end of a tunnel drixen into a perpendicular bank much fre- 



a. First record by R. H. I..iwrcncc: Two seen on Stevens Prairie [Gray's Harbor County] April 22 

 [1891] (yidc .^uk, Vol. IX., Jan. 1892. p. 47). Second record by ttic autlior: Male and female with 

 five full. grown young encountered near Sluiskin Falls on Mt. Rainier, July ;. 1908. at an altitude of 

 £500 feet. 



