^"'■fgio^"] Bailey, The Palm-leaf Oriole. 35 



a palm leaf made of palm fibers with strands dangling — with 

 just head space above. Both birds were busy feeding. . . .Saw 

 one perch picturesquely on the tip of an agave — the handsome 

 yellow bird with the black face on the sage-colored agave." Under 

 date of June 26, at Twin Oaks, I noted: "Several old nests are 

 about the ])lace, in oaks, umbrella tree and the one fan palm. There 

 are two males about the house, one that perches on the windmill 

 and one that, with his mate, is fllying with streamers of pahn fiber." 

 The orioles were said to have built in this palm for several years 

 but now disturbed by the presence of onlookers were gathering 

 fiber to carry to another tree. On July 8, at San Diego, as we were 

 ])assing a fan palm "on a lawn on Fifth Street," a handsome old 

 male oriole almost flew into our faces as he dove in with food for 

 the young. On July 23, in the hotel yard at Cold Water Canon 

 one oriole was seen feeding young and another starting to build. 

 Here we were interested to find two old oriole nests occupied by 

 linnets, the striped heads of the linnets looking amusingly out of 

 place over the edge of the oriole's hanging basket. On July 29, at 

 Hemet, the man who was trimming ])alms reported finding one nest 

 with eggs and another with three young whose mother hung by the 

 foot caught in the tangle of fibers depending from the nest. 



The workman saved a fan with a nest for us, and the section con- 

 taining the nest was brought east and photographed. The nest 

 is supported on each side by fiber threads sewed through the leaf, 

 and the nest itself, particularly the outer framcM^ork, intricately 

 woven of the same fiber. The only lining is of finer threads. 



The nest found in the pepper tree was not so dependent on strong 

 sewing as that in the fan palm, foi- it was supported by the delicate 

 twigs of the pepper sprays around which the fibers were securely 

 bound. Palm fiber nests, besides this found in the pepper tree 

 and those mentioned previously in oaks and umbrella trees, were 

 seen and reported, one in a eucalyptus at Cold Water Cafion, 

 where it made the twenty-fourth nest in a radius of a few rods, and 

 another at Riverside where it hung from the gold of ophir and 

 jasmine vines of a ])iazza. 



By the time I had listed the fifty-two nests made of jialm fiber, 

 forty of which were hung in the palm, it seemed that, in southern 

 California at least, nelsoni had won its right to the name of Palm- 

 leaf Oriole. 



