THE OOLOGIST 



258 



House Finches 



-Photo by Earl R. Forrest 



with water, and soon great numbers 

 of birds came there to drink. 



I immediately became interested 

 and spent much time at my friend's 

 house, where I identified the follow- 

 ing species which came there to this 

 fountain : 



Melanerpes uropygialis. Gila Wood- 

 pecker. 



Aphelocoma sieberii arizonae. Ari- 

 zona Jay. 



Carpodacus mexicanus frontalis. 

 House Finch. 



Mimus polyglottos leucopterus. Wes- 

 tern Mockingbird. 



Sialia mexicana occidentalis. Wes- 

 tern Bluebird. 



Sialia arctica. Mountain Bluebird. 



Other species were observed in the 

 locality, but they were too shy to ven- 

 ture so near to the house. 



We watched them closely and they 

 all seemed to have a certain time for 

 coming. The bluebirds of both varie- 

 ties generally arrived a little after 



dawn, and as time passed and the 

 fame of the fountain spread in the 

 bird world their numbers greatly in- 

 creased. They always made such a 

 fuss and commotion that it was im- 

 possible to sleep after their arrival. 

 After the bluebirds had quenched their 

 thirst somewhat, and there would only 

 be a few stragglers left, the House 

 Finches would appear and drive these 

 away. In this connection I noticed 

 that no two species would drink at 

 the same time, except when there 

 were only three or four of each kind. 

 The bluebirds always kept the House 

 Finches away when there was any 

 number of the former, and so the lat- 

 ter would not come until the former 

 had practically retired. When the 

 most of the finches had departed and 

 the place was pretty quiet one or two 

 Arizona Jays would appear. These 

 birds generally came singly or In 



