BLUE OR METALLIC BLUE 499 
California Breeding Range: Below Boreal zone, nearly throughout the 
State. 
Breeding Season: May and June. 
Nest: Of fine strips of bark, small twigs, grasses; lined with hair; 
placed in trees or bushes a few feet from the ground. 
Eggs: 3 or 4; plain bluish white or light bluish green. Size 0.75 X 
0.58. 
AuTHoueH the Lazuli Bunting is found on the higher 
Sierra Nevada, his best loved haunts are the lower moun- 
tain thickets and the chaparral-covered foot-hills. While 
the showily plumaged male flies through the open, from 
tree-top to tree-top, his little brown mate keeps well 
within the cover of the bushes, zigzagging her way 
through the chaparral like a shy sparrow. From the 
plains to the Pacific this species replaces the indigo 
bunting of the East. 
The song of the Lazuli is loud, sweet, and merry, but 
is chiefly remarkable for the fine enthusiasm of the 
singer. Long after the other birds, worn out by family 
cares, have ceased their music, this blithe “ little boy 
blue” carols his jolly roundelay from the top of a tall 
tree as gayly as though there were no such thing as 
work in the world. For this we love him. Yet snugly 
hidden among the bushes is the cup-shaped nest, where 
in the June days his mate brooded over the pretty nest- 
lings, and where he was kept busy hunting bugs for the 
hungry mouths; and there may have been a second 
brood to be looked after, as there often is in the Bunt- 
ing family. At any rate, he has had his full share of 
labor in nest-building, incubating, guarding, and feeding, 
and has come out of it without losing one iota of en- 
thusiasm in the joy of living. 
