16 Bowdish, Warblers Breeding at Desmarest, N. J . [ja'i^ 



SOME BREEDING WARBLERS OF DEMAREST, N.J. 



BY B. S. BOWDISH. 



This paper is not put forward as a complete list of all the war- 

 blers that have bred around Demarest, for such a paper must needs 

 be the result of many seasons painstaking observation. The pres- 

 ent paper deals with such breeding evidence as has come under the 

 necessarily limited observation of the author during the past three 

 seasons. 



The Black and White Warbler (Mniotilta varia) is a regular, 

 though not abundant, summer resident. Aside from the presence 

 of the birds in pairs during the breeding season, the evidence of 

 its breeding depends on the record of a nest found by Miss Christa- 

 bel M. Everett in the summer of 1901, and on a pair found by Mr. 

 Abbott and the writer, June 17 last, accompanied by young a few 

 days out of the nest. 



The Blue-winged Warbler (Helminthophila pinus) is a quite 

 abundant breeder, yet so successfully are the nests concealed, and 

 so closely does the mother bird sit, that the nests are not often 

 found. On June 11, 1904, a nest was found among the rank 

 grass and weeds, in a bush- and weed-grown field, the bottom 

 just above the ground. It was a frail structure, of fine stems and 

 hair, and contained four young but a short time hatched. The 

 female returned to the nest while the camera was within thirty 

 inches of it. On May 12, of the present year, while passing a 

 bushy point of woods jutting into a weed-grown field, I noticed a 

 female Blue-winged Warbler with a dead oak leaf in her bill, and 

 accompanied by her mate. After watching for a few minutes, 

 without being able to track her to the prospective nest, I left, fear- 

 ing to disturb her. I returned to the spot on the 15th and, with- 

 out seeing the birds, I chanced quickly on the nest, built under a 

 dead branch, near the base of a small cedar, and entirely covered 

 with dead oak leaves, so laid as to leave only a mouse-like entrance. 

 At this time no eggs had been laid, the nest seeming to be just 

 newly finished. The first egg was laid on the 19th, and one egg 

 added each day, the fifth and last egg being deposited May 23. 



