THE NIDIOLOGIST. 



99 



MEXICAN CROSSBILL, NEST AND EGGS. 



AMERICAN AND MEXICAN CROSS- 

 BILLS. 



BY G. F. BRENINGER. 



Those who have made Ornithology and 

 Oology a study, either through the pur- 

 chase of specimens or through actual field 

 work, know that nests of our American 

 species of Crossbills have been rarely found, 

 and consequently but few sets of eggs exist 

 in public or private museums. Eggs of 

 the European Crossbill {Loxia curvirostis) 

 have been frequently taken; in fact, are 

 quite common in collections of foreign ma- 

 terial. Records of the nesting of our 

 American Red Crossbill {Loxia curvirostis 

 minor) are indeed few; so much so that all 

 recent writers have been forced through 

 necessity to copy the original descriptions 

 of eggs and nesting sites from observations 

 made twenty years ago. 



While but few sets of the small beaked 

 form have been taken heretofore, still less 



have been taken of the Mexican variety 

 ( Loxia curvirostis stricklandi) . Our knowl- 

 edge of the nidification is limited to the 

 single record made by Charles F. Morrison, 

 then at Fort lycwis, Colorado, who dis- 

 covered a nest with eggs during the latter 

 part of January. 



During the winter of '92 and '93, while 

 I was stationed as Superintendent of the Di- 

 vide Experiment Station in El Paso County, 

 Colorado, I made an exhaustive study of 

 the two forms of Crossbills inhabiting that 

 vicinity. The region was one of pine-cov- 

 ered hills, drained b}^ innumerable streams 

 whose banks were fringed with tall silver 

 spruce and mountain willows. The approx- 

 imate altitude was about 7,500 feet. Here 

 I discovered the birds in August of the pre- 

 ceding summer — shooting two birds — a 

 male and a female. 



As the season of a plentitude of ripe 

 seeds approached, I observed a steady in- 

 crease in the quantity of birds, and at the 



