1162 



REPORT OF STATK GEOLOGIST. 



The. Bluebird is a common summer resident. It is also resident, 

 being most common southward and varying in numbers different 

 years. The past twenty or twenty-five years the Bluebird has been 

 noticeably becoming less numerous. The persecutions of the English 

 Sparrow and several disastrous winters had almost exterminated them. 

 They are, however, now increasing in numbers. They usually remain 

 through the winter in greater or less numbers as far north as Knox, 

 Monroe and Brown counties and almost to Decatur and Franklin 

 where they are often found at that season. Irregularly they are found 

 over the State. The winter of 1893-4 they were reported at Green- 

 castle and Greensburg; of 1894-5, at Greencastle, Greensburg, Brook- 



Bluebird. 



(Beal Farmer's Bulletin 54, United States Department of Agriculture.) 



ville and Oxford, 0.; and that of 1896-7, at Hanover, Brookville. 

 Greensburg, and even at Angola, Steuben County. The following are 

 early and late dates of the beginning of migration: Richmond, Feb- 

 ruary l, 1895, February 24, 1892; Sedan, February 9, 1894, February 

 27, 1896; Lafayette, February 22, 1892, March 17, 1896; Laporte, 

 February 27, 1894, March 29, 1896; Chicago, March 3, 1894, March 

 29, 1896. The following dates of the beginning of migration for the 

 spring of 1897 is an average date: Brookville, February 11; Richmond, 

 February 16; Janesville, February 21; Waterloo, February 24; Ed- 

 wards, Vigo County, February 28; Lafayette, March 7; Liverpool, 

 March 10; Chicago, March 12; Petersburg, Mich., March 6. 



I found them paired by February 10, 1882. March 10, 1881, they 

 were nest hunting, and April 11, that year, they were nesting. 



