14 Bulletin No. 3 



mer, flying high above the Castle but they did not venture to light 

 upon it. 



The year after this disaster with martins, one pair of tree 

 swallows came to the Castle and took up their abode there. They 

 raised a nice family of tree swallows. Two families of tree swallows 

 have occupied the Castle every year since. 



Last winter I made up my mind to try the experiment of hatching 

 purple martins eggs under the tree swallows to again establish my 

 colony of martins. I wrote J. Warren Jacobs, ornithologist and 

 oologist, of Waynesburg, Pa., (who has one of the largest colonies of 

 purple martins in the United States) to see if he could furnish me with 

 a few eggs for the experiment. Through his kindness he sent me four 

 eggs. 



The experiment was tried under very favorable circumstances, as 

 the tree swallows were occupying my old purple martin house and had 

 been for three years. The story of the experiment is best told in the 

 following extracts from my daily note book: 



"May 31, receive four purple martin's eggs from J. Warren Jacobs, 

 Waynesburg, Pa. June 1, I find six tree swallow eggs in a nest, remove 

 four eggs and place the four martin eggs in nest. June 6, I remove 

 the other two tree swallow eggs, leaving the four martin eggs in the 

 nest only. Swallow sitting on eggs nicely. June 11, swallow sitting 

 on eggs O. K. June 15, eggs not hatched. June 16, 7 A. M., find one 

 egg hatched; 6 P. M., find two more eggs hatched. June 17, 7 A. M., I find 

 the other egg hatched. Young martins doing well. Foster parents 

 feeding young martins as though they were their own. June 19, 

 visit the young martins this morning, find them doing well. June 

 22, visit martins this morning, find them growing and looking finely. 

 Eyes not open yet and not a feather started. Foster parents feeding 

 them nicely. June 24, visit young martins this morning and find them 

 progressing finely. Feathers begin to show under the skin. Eyes just 

 beginning to open a little. Foster parents are caring for them nicely. 

 June 25, I find martins eyes about one-third open. Feathers just 

 begin to show through skin. Young birds cared for finely. June 26, 

 this morning I find the young martins' eyes open; feathers well started 

 through skin; tail feathers show quite a little. All doing finely and 

 all plump and fat. Foster parents giving them the best of care. 

 June 29, 7 A. M., a visit to the martin house. I find not a young martin 

 in the nest; find one on the ground under the house. From the appear- 

 ance of the young birds should say it had been dead two or three 

 days. Could not find the other three. What caused the disaster I 

 cannot conceive unless the foster parents found out that they were not 



