328 Saunders, Nesting of the Cedar Waxwing. [.July 



pimples appear on top of the head. In eight or nine days the head 

 and breast feathers appear, the feathers of the back begin to break 

 their sheaths and pimples appear on the throat. By ten to twelve 

 days the throat and tail feathers appear, the wing quills and head 

 feathers break their sheaths, and the creamy white streak above 

 the eye, a mark of the young bird only, begins to show plainly. 

 By twelve to fourteen days the eyes are wide open and all the 

 feathers are unsheathed or unsheathing except those forming the 

 black patch on the forehead and about the eyes. These feathers 

 are last of all to appear and do not break the sheaths till about the 

 fifteenth day or later, sometimes after the young have left the nest. 

 This fact appears to have led some writers to state that young 

 Waxwings do not have this black mark. By fourteen to eighteen 

 days the young are fully fledged and leave the nest shortly, being 

 able to fly a little as soon as they leave. For a few days after 

 leaving they may usually be found in the vicinity of the nest, the 

 whole brood perched together in a row, with necks stretched and 

 bills pointing up in the air in the same manner as the adults. 



The difference in the development of the different broods was 

 evidently due to a difference in frequency of feeding by the parents. 

 The brood leaving the nest in fourteen days was fed often for this 

 species, every fifteen minutes, at least during part of the day. The 

 brood leaving in eighteen days was fed on an average of about 

 once an hour. The last brood left the nest on September 20. 



Late in November, after the leaves had fallen, I visited the 

 thicket again to see how many Waxwing nests in all were there. 

 I found seven more nests evidently of this species, making a total 

 of seventeen. These other nests were some distance from the 

 ones I studied and much more scattered. All of the seventeen, 

 however, could be included within a radius of 150 yards. 



The next year I was away from this vicinity most of the summer 

 but returned in September. On September 211 visited the thicket 

 again to see if the Waxwings had been there that summer. After a 

 long search I found two nests, both empty, but one with a parent 

 bird and brood of four young sitting in the bush above it. This 

 was just one day more than a year since the last brood of the year 

 before had left the nest. The birds were there but not in the same 

 numbers as the previous year. Evidently Waxwings do not 



