No. 3.] 



SENNETT OX THE ORNITHOLOGY OF TEXAS. 



395 



fied, is always distingnisbable. It feeds upon larvae and seeds, especially 

 tlie seeds of the wild-tomato, and begins to breed early. 



On April 19 there were brought me an adult male, a young bird more 

 than half- grown and just from the nest, and a nest containing two eggs 

 about to hatch, — all of this species, and obtained in one clump of bushes. 



Within the past three seasons large numbers of nests and eggs of this 

 Finch have been secured by Dr. Merrill and myself on the Lower Eio 

 Grande. The doctor first found them in the vicinity of Brownsville, and 

 later I found them abundantly some seventy miles further up the river. 

 The domed nests are situated in the heart of bushes, generally from two 

 to five feet above the ground. They were found in all sorts of open 

 thickets. One I detected close by the roadside, in a clump of bushes, 

 under a small tree ; another on a dry knoll, which was covered with 

 cacti, thorny bushes of various kinds, and scattering trees of mesquite 

 and ebony, and in close proximity to nests of the Long-billed Thrasher 

 and the Yellow-billed Cuckoo. Most frequently, however, nests were 

 found in those depressions near woods, where water stands during the 

 wet season, which, when dry, abound with grass hummocks and bunches 

 of rank weeds covered with wild-tomato vines. The nests are nearly 

 round in shape, large for the size of the bird, and constructed of dried 

 weed-stems, pieces of bark, grasses, and leaves, — sometimes with a little 

 hair for lining of the bottom, but more frequently without. The com- 

 plement of eggs is four, and two or three broods are raised in a season. 

 Several sets of eggs were found in April, but many more early in May, 

 while by the 20th of May embryos were well formed. Dr. Merrill fonnd 

 fresh eggs August 5 near Fort Brown, and others slightly incubated on 

 September 7. The eggs are pure dull white and rounded oval in shape, 

 with the greatest diameter generally much nearer one end than the other. 

 In a large series before me the length varies from .91 to .76 and the 

 breadth from .09 to .60, averaging .84 by .65. 



First plumage : above, mixed olive-tawny and brown; wings brown, 

 edged olive-green ; wing-coverts tipped and edged tawny ; breast same 



as back ; belly tawny ; bill brown 



feet pale fulvous-brown. 



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Bull. V, 3- 



