J 4 Peabody. Nesting of fCrider's ffaxvk. \ 



Auk 

 Jan. 



On April 22, 1894, a pair of birds were at the above described 

 nest and very uneasy. No repairs on nest, which was not 

 visited by me later. 



Set IV. — Owatonna, Rice County, Minn., May 3, 1S93. Incubation, far 

 advanced. Locality, the very steep, deep, and heavily wooded bank of 

 river, fringing a cultivated plateau. One mile from nest III. A flat, old 

 nest, far out, nearly over the water, on leaning branch of rock maple, 

 sixty feet up. Large sticks. Lining, soft fibrous bark and grass. 

 Female on nest; when the latter was discovered flew away, showing 

 characteristic markings, but made no outcry, and did not return. Three 

 eggs: No. i, ovate, 2.50x1.89 (cracked and addled); largely unmarked; 

 pale cinnamon blotch at smaller end; a cap of similar blotches at apex, 

 over-laid by a very few dark cinnamon spots. No. 2, rounded ovate, 

 2.45 X 1.87 ; everywhere, but chiefly at the apex, very delicately marbled 

 with an admixture of pale cinnamon and lilac, beautifully veined with 

 deeper lilac; scattered lilac blotches at smaller end. No. 3, much rounded, 

 ovate, 2.48x1.98; largely unmarked, apex capped with blotches of 

 cinnamon lilac which are over-laid with three or four daubs of bright, 

 dark cinnamon. This set thvis like eggs of B. lineafits. The above nest 

 was unoccupied April 22, 1894. 



Set V. — May 6, 1894, Owatonna, Minn. Incubation, three-fourths. 

 Locality, a hillside, on a wild 'quarter section ' of timber land three miles 

 east of the river ; dense undergrowths of hazel, cherry, and poplar ; 

 scattered primeval white and black oaks. Nest, two-thirds the distance 

 up a small black oak-tree, at base of small branches, close to trunk. The 

 original nest had blown or settled outward, and the '94 nest was built on 

 its upper edge, thirty-five feet from ground, of sticks, lined with poplar 

 bark, grass and corn-shucks. Three eggs: No. i, ovate, 2.49x1.87; 

 white, a circle of longitudinal pale cinnamon streaks about larger end, 

 over-laid with a few darker blotches. Scattered spots over the rest of the 

 surface. No. 2, size, shape, color, quite like the above, save that the 

 streaks center at the apex. No. 3, distinctly pyriform, 2.50x1.90. 

 Whole surface spattei-ed obscurely, and apex crowned, with spots of 

 cinnamon. 



A second nest appears to have been built in 1893 by these 

 birds, in a white oak forty rods away, in a valley near the margin 

 of the woodland. This nest was first seen from the highway in 

 March, 1894. 



Set VI. — On April 22 following, the above site was revisited. Nest V 

 was unoccupied, but the female krideri was found on the nest above in- 

 dicated, a slight structure, but little more than half the distance up a 

 rather small, primeval white oak, close to the trunk. The deep hollow 

 was lined with corn-strippings. Distance, fifty feet up. Two eggs : 

 No. I, remarkably like No. 3 of the preceding, 2.50x1.87; rather pear- 



