REPORT UPON ORNITHOLOGICAL SPECIMENS. 



83 



or seven inches in diameter, very bulky, and composed of sticks, weeds, 

 and coarse grasses, inside which is usually a thick layer of mud, lined 

 with rootlets and fine grasses. The eggs vary in number from four to 

 six, usually five ; the color varies from a dull olivaceous to a pale bluish- 

 white, and are thickly covered with blotches of light-brown and burned- 

 umber, this latter color often in the form of wavering lines. In some 

 specimens the brown spots are confluent, and nearly hide the ground- 

 color. 



CORVID^E (the Crows). 



58. Corvus cor ax, L., var. carnivorus, Bart. Raven. 



Abundant; especially numerous about cattle-ranches. Breed usually 

 on inaccessible cliffs. 



59. Picicorvus columbianus (Wils.) Nutcracker; Clarke's Crow. 

 During the latter part of May, I met with this species once or twice 



in the neighborhood of Baldy Peak, ten miles from Garland. They 

 appeared very uneasy, flying about and alighting on the high pine-stubs, 

 but their extreme shyness rendered it impossible to approach within 

 satisfactory observing distance. As the previous* year in Utah, where 

 this was an abundant species, their shyness and habit of constantly 

 moving from place to place made all attempts to even procure a speci- 

 men fruitless, my surprise may be imagined when, on visiting the sum- 

 mer cavalry-camp established on the Rio Grande, I found these birds 

 regular daily visitors about camp, and exhibiting the same confiding 

 familiarity as does the well-known Canada Jay or Whisky- Jack (Peri- 

 soreus canadensis) of the north in the lumberman's camp. Early in the 

 morning their well-known hoarse, rattling cries proclaimed their pres- 

 ence, as they flew down from the tops of the high pine-clothed ridges, 

 where at night they always retired to roost. So tame had they become 

 that they would frequently alight on the ground, or the low branch of 

 a tree, but a few feet distant from the lookers-on, and on one occasion a 

 fearless individual was seen to enter a tent. On the ground, their 

 motions appeared somewhat awkward, and they were only perfectly at 

 home when among the pine-trees, in a small grove of which the tents 

 were pitched. They eagerly seized upon any of the refuse thrown 

 away by the cook, and scraps of meat were readily taken, and, if too 

 large to be easily swallowed, carried up to the nearest horizontal limb 

 and vigorously hammered till reduced to proper fragments. The corn 

 and grain scattered about by the horses when feeding were also special 

 objects of attention. They were rather quarrelsome, and when a con- 

 tented croak betrayed the finder of some titbit a number instantly made 



