viii PREFACE 



Here grows the Giant Cactus, that Sentinel of the Desert, an 

 apartment-house of the Gilded Flicker and the Gila Woodpecker, 

 whose abandoned holes shelter the Elf Owl, the Sahuaro Screech 

 Owl, and the Arizona Crested Flycatcher. Near neighbors are the 

 mesquite and catclaw, in which the yellow-headed Verdin weaves 

 his ingenious domed nest of thorny twigs. 



Western literature has long ago made famous birds charac- 

 teristic of this Southwestern United States, birds with vivid per- 

 sonalities that imprint indelible pictures on eye and ear. Vaca- 

 tion days are incomplete without such memories as these: the 

 vibrating wings of the White-throated Swift; the raucous croak 

 of the Clarke Nutcracker in his high mountain habitat; the de- 

 scending crescendo of the'Canyon Wren garbed in his silky-white 

 vest; the confiding ways of the Valley Quail nesting, perchance, 

 among the geraniums of Hollywood hillside homes; Ouzels, 

 relatives of the Mockingbird, at home in the swiftest mountain 

 streams and nesting behind water-falls; the Wren-Tit, chattering 

 confidentially as it creeps through the chaparral beside you; the 

 restless Bush-Tit with its cleverly woven, deeply pouched nest; 

 the Blue-fronted Jay, that swaggering, noisy bandit of the coni- 

 ferous forest. 



For encouragement and moral support in the preparation of 

 this work the authors acknowledge indebtedness to a host of 

 friends, largely members of the Cooper Ornithological Club and 

 the Los Angeles Audubon Society. Special recognition is due Mrs. 

 Mary A. Burnell and Miss Mildred E. Sykes, pen-artists, whose 

 work, it is believed, will contribute largely to the success and use- 

 fulness of the book; and to Ralph L. Gamier and Ray M. Sey- 

 mour, engravers, for invaluable advice and assistance in the 

 preparation of the cuts used. To all these, named and unnamed, 

 the authors extend sincere thanks. 



Los ANGELES 

 August, 1925 



