°iSoft Merriam, Some Birds of Southern California. 117 



the hole, by that means laboriously drawing up its body and wedging 

 itself through. June 2, 1S94, I found young Sparrow Hawks nearly ready 

 to fly. 



Strix pratincola. American Barn Owl. — April 5, 1889,1 found one 

 nesting in the charred hollow of a sycamore limb. Edwin Merriam told me 

 that he had known the birds to change places on the nest in the daytime, 

 and both birds to stay in the hole. They seemed to fly into any dark hole 

 they could find to protect them during the day. A number were found in 

 a partially covered well in the valley, and three were taken from a wind- 

 mill tank in the neighborhood in about a month. In a mine at Escondido 

 a number were found sitting in a crevice where the earth had caved, and 

 about a dozen more at the bottom of the mine shaft, fifty to a hundred 

 feet underground. 



Bubo virginianus subarcticus. Western Horned Owl. — Found a 

 nest with young. April 9, 18S9. Saw another brooding, April 23, 1S94. 



Speotyto cunicularia hypogaea. Burrowing Owl. — The Owls, besides 

 using ground squirrel holes, built in old badger holes in the red lands of 

 the San Marcos grant. I once saw nine sitting around one burrow. 



Geococcyx californianus. Road-runner. — In May, 1S94, I found a 

 nest in a eucalyptus grove, about seven feet from the ground. It was 

 partly lined with horse manure, which I was told the birds often used in 

 their nests in the vicinity. The Road-runner is so protectively colored 

 that when crossing a bare field it does not attract the eve. but when it 

 stops and raises its long neck and tail, it looks like two sticks in the 

 meadow. 



Melanerpes formicivorus bairdi. California Woodpecker. — May 

 12, 1S94, I found a pair of the Woodpeckers nesting. June 16 I heard the 

 weak voices of young. July (1 the old Woodpeckers were found dead and 

 I had the young taken from the nest, apparently just about ready to fly. 

 The old birds were very shy at the nest, but at their hunting ground. 

 nearly half a mile away, where they went to get food for the young, 

 they were indifferent to spectators. They perched on a sycamore limb 

 and made sallies over the alfalfa or out in the air. They also hunted 

 from the posts of the wire fence. They seemed to light indifferently on 

 top of the posts or against their sides, and I often saw them perch on a 

 horizontal limb of the sycamore. They seemed more like Flycatchers 

 than Woodpeckers, they spent so much time on the wing catching insects. 

 In general habits they closely resemble our eastern Melanerpes erythro- 

 ccphalus. Their cries and calls are almost identical. 



Edwin Merriam told me that the Woodpeckers excavate nests a foot and 

 a half to two feet deep, often making several elbows, changing the angle 

 to the excavation to follow the soft wood. He said the birds seem to 

 prefer the white oak for building, as for storing acorns ; and use the 

 same hole year after year, for the outer shell of the white oak — unlike 

 the live oak — is very durable. The century plant grows wild on the 

 ridges of the hills near the San Luis Rev mission, and he has found the 



