Description of the Nest and Eggs of Chloro- 

 drepanis virens (Gmel.). 



WM. AI^ANSON BRYAN. 



The Museum is indebted to Mr. C. E. Blacow for a well 

 identified nest containing three eggs of the Hawaii Amakihi 

 which were colledled at Horner's Ranch, in the Hamakua district, 

 on Ma}^ 3, 1905. Mr. Blacow states that the parent bird was 

 on the nest when it was found, thus establishing its identity. 

 It is about four inches across by two and one-half inches deep ; 

 externally it is composed of fine twigs and bits of grass ; the lining 

 is of cream-colored lichens, such as are common in the forests in 

 the rainy distridts. Into the coarse materials are woven a number 

 of the balloon-shaped egg cases of certain species of spiders. These 

 somewhat resemble the husks of the Poha {Physalis peruviana) , 

 and are possibly what Mr. Perkins identified as such. The struc- 

 ture is neat, compact and well made. The eggs have a creamy 

 white ground which is covered with pale lilac and smoke-grey 

 freckles crowded together at the larger end to form a cap-like zone. 

 The eggs are remarkably uniform in size, shape and color, meas- 

 uring .57X.72in., .55X.73in-. .56X.74in- respe(5lively. 



Mr, Palmer has reported (Avifauna of Laysan, p. 134) that 

 ' ' On May 5 one was seen carrying moss or some other green material 

 as if for building a nest. On May 17 three nests were found, but 

 all empt5^ They were very much like the one received from Mr. 

 Baldwin, and were outside built of sticks, then of moss and lined 

 with fine roots, open above, and about two and one-half inches in 

 diameter." Mr. Perkins, without giving the exact season, states 

 that "I have found the nest in several trees at very different 

 heights in these trees. It is lined with roots and has many fruit 

 capsules of the Poha, dry and more or less skeletonized, woven in 

 the outside." From the meagre data that has thus far been 

 gathered we conclude that April and May are the months in which 

 C. virens usually breeds. 



The eggs before me are much paler in color than those shown 

 by Professor Newton (P. Z. S., 1897, p. 893, pi. li). Those figured 



[243] f50 



