226 Yellow-Headed Blackbird 



site and returns year after year, even when the surroundings undergo 

 great and uncongenial changes, deserting it only with the drying up of 

 the marsh. The Yellowhead is very closely restricted to its special nest- 

 ing haunts, and as the members of each colony go in the spring directly 

 to their particular rendezvous, and wander but a little 

 way into the surrounding country until after the com- 

 pletion of the breeding period, they are easily over- 

 looked if their nesting sloughs are not numerous or their homes be not 

 actually invaded. 



In the northward movement in spring the vanguard of the Yellow- 

 heads that are to breed in Canada reach the international boundary 

 about May 1, the males preceding the females by a few days. In Minne- 

 sota, where the writer's entire experience with this bird has been gained, 

 stragglers enter the southern part of the State about the middle of April, 

 but it is not until the very last of that month or early in May that they 

 become numerous. 



In this region they breed almost exclusively in the dense growth of 

 quill-reeds (Phragmites) that fills or encircles many of the sloughs and 

 shallow lakes of the prairie and semi-prairie parts of the State. Occa- 

 sionally spring freshets or other disturbances may drive them to place 

 their nests among bulrushes (Scirpus} in upland sloughs, or more rarely 

 still in willows and bushes adjacent to open water. 

 A Denizen Nest-building is usually begun in central Minnesota 

 of the Reeds about the ^dle of May and continues until well into 

 June. It seems probable, however, that only one brood is raised in a 

 season, the great variation in the nesting-time being explainable by the 

 depredations of various small animals, which devour the eggs and young, 

 and by severe elemental disturbances. 



The examination of many hundreds of nests over a long period of 

 time and a detailed study of a single colony* throughout the entire breed- 

 ing season furnish the data for the following summary of the chief fea- 

 tures of the nesting of the Yellowhead : 



The female builds the nest and incubates the eggs without any assist- 

 ance by the male. 



The male assists in the care of the young, but only to a limited ex- 

 tent and chiefly after they leave the nest. 



The body of the nest is constructed of wet material collected from 

 the water near by. This is woven about the stems 

 Structure Q ^ reec j S) two or \\\ rtt f ee t above the water, and 



of the Nest ., , , ,. r ,, , 



its drying and contracting fixes the nest securely m 



position, as is well shown in the illustration on page 225. 



The lining consists of pieces of broad, dry reed-leaves, and often the 

 rim of the nest is finished with the fine branches of the plume-like 

 fruiting-tops of the reeds, forming a sort of canopy over the somewhat 

 constricted entrance. 



For fuller details, see The <4wfe,.xxvi, 1909, pp. 371-389, 10 plates, 24 photographs. 



