Vol XIII 



Merriam, Some Birds of Southern California. IIQ 



pressing so hard she ruffled up the feathers of her breast. She shaped 

 the cup as if it were a piece of clay. To round the outside she would sit 

 on the rim and lean over, smoothing the sides with her bill, often with the 

 same tremulous motion. When she wanted to turn around in the nest 

 she lifted herself bv whirring her wings. 



May 24, 1S94, I saw a female Hummingbird sit on an oak twig, while 

 a male, with the sound and regularity of a spindle in a machine, swung 

 back and forth in an arc less than a yard long. He never turned around, 

 but threw himself back at the end of the line by a quick spread of the 

 tail. 



Mav 19, 1894. I saw two different males go through a similar perform- 

 ance, though I could not discover the females. Thev flew backwards and 

 sidewise, not turning around. They dove with gorgets puffed out and 

 tails spread, making a loud whirring sound. April 26, 1889, while riding 

 along the chaparral, I stopped a few moments and a Hummingbird shot 

 down at my horse, darted up in the air and shot down again about a 

 dozen times. It stopped itself in going up by suddenly closing its 

 wings, then it turned around, opened its wings and darted down, "all 

 sound." When hovering around oak trunks and feeding from flowers, 

 I have seen the birds throw themselves up by giving a toss with their tails. 



Selasphorus rufus. Rufous Hummingbird. — In April, when the 

 wild gooseberrv bushes are in bloom, they are fairly alive with the Rufous 

 Hummingbirds, who find food in the red tubular blossoms. The whizzing 

 and whirring lead you to the bushes from a distance and as you approach, 

 the birds dart out, shoot up into the sky, sweep down and, pell mell, chase 

 after each other through the air. The Rufous Hummingbirds must have 

 been migrants at Twin Oaks, for thev disappeared entirely. 



Tyrannus vociferans. L'assin's Kingbird. — April 28, 18S9, I found 

 a Flycatcher's nest in a sycamore. The birds also built in the oaks near 

 the house, making a bulky untidy nest, with string dangling from its sides. 

 Mav 30, 1894, a pair were still building in a sycamore. Mr. Merriam 

 told me that when he was plowing and the Blackbirds were following 

 him, two or three of the 'Beebirds,' as he called them, would take up 

 positions on stakes overlooking the flock ; and when one of the Black- 

 birds got a worm that he could not gulp right down, a Beebird would 

 dart after him and fight for it, chasing the Blackbird till he got it away. 

 For the time the Flycatchers regularly made their living off the Black- 

 birds as the Eagles do from the Fish Hawks. 



Myiarchus cinerascens. Ash-throated Flycatcher. — Seen in the 

 chaparral and in the orchards hunting low for insects. Their calls closely 

 resemble those of the eastern Great-crest, M. crinitus. Some are like 

 i/nir r' r, quirp' and qtiir' 'r-rhea' '. The bird also says hip' , hip', hawkeer, 

 the hip emphasized with a vertical flip of the tail, the wheer, with a side- 

 wise dash. The Flycatcher has besides a low call of hip and haivhip. 

 Mr. Merriam told me that the birds nest in old Woodpecker holes, and 

 line their nests with hair. 



