WITH BROWN PREDOMINATING 261 
the wood, when they would answer every call, coming 
nearer and nearer until they lit on a branch of hawthorn 
berries I was carrying and began to eat as I walked 
along. JI know of no other birds who will endure so 
much meddling with their domestic affairs with no show 
of resentment or deserting the nest. They will suffer all 
sorts of indignities and disturbance of nesting site and 
environment without seeming to be disconcerted. This 
is due to the remarkable devotion of the adults to their 
brood, which induces them to care for the young at what- 
ever cost to themselves. Most of the feeding is done 
by regurgitation, and often the gular pouches of the 
adult will be noticeably swollen as he comes to the nest 
with it full of food, which he transfers to the throats of 
his brood. It is less easy to tell what that food is by 
looking at the crops of young birds fed by regurgitation 
than of those fed with the raw food, yet it is often quite 
possible to do so with unfeathered nestlings. In the 
case of the young Waxwings the remains of insects were 
plainly visible through the semi-transparent skin; and 
about as soon as the feathers appeared the regurgitation 
was supplanted by feeding at first hand with large in- 
sects. The food of the adults consists of insects, seeds, 
berries of trees, and any small fruits except strawberries. 
The Cedar Waxwings have no varied song, but they 
have a soft, conversational, whistling chirp and a plain- 
tive call-note like ‘“ pee-eet, pee-eet”’ which they keep 
up most of the time. 
They occur in California during the fall, winter, and 
spring, departing in June for their northern breeding 
grounds. 
