AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 89 



NESTING HABITS. 



Chestnut-sides always nest at low elevations usually within three 

 feet of the ground. Their favorite location is in the top of a small 

 shrub where the nest is completely concealed from view by the cluster 

 of leaves. I have found a great many nests in patches of sweet fern. 

 They are made of fibres and grasses tightly woven together and lined 

 with fine grasses and hair. They lay four or five creamy white eggs 

 quite strongly marked with reddish brown and usually with obscure 

 markings of gray or lilac. 



HABITS. 



In New England, New York and Pennsylvania these birds are very 

 abundant, in some places even outnumbering the Yellow Warbler. 

 They are commonly found on low hillsides and in pasture land 

 wherever low brush is to be found. Their song is very similar to that 

 of the Yellow Warbler and also the Redstart and only the most 

 practised ear can identify the birds by their notes. The best way to 

 find their nests is to stoop so that you can look up under the tops of 

 the bushes and if the nest is within a few feet you will surely see it, 

 whereas hunting them from above is very difficult. The birds are 

 very tame when sitting on their nests and a number of times, by 

 carefully parting the leaves over a nest, I have stroked the back of the 

 sitting bird before she would leave. They can very readily be tamed 

 so as to take insects from the hand when they are offered and 

 especially easy to photograph. They moult during the latter part of 

 July and August, and toward the end of this month and in September 

 it is difficult to find an individual with any chestnut, black or yellow 

 in the plumage. 



BAY^BREASTED WARBLER, 



A. O. U- No. 660- (Dendroica castanea.) 



RANGE. 



This species breeds in the southern parts of the British Provinces 

 west to Manitoba. In the United States they breed only in northern 

 New England and Michigan. Their routes of migration vary in differ- 

 ent years so that they cannot be looked for with certainty in any local- 

 ity. They winter in southern Central America and northern South 

 America. 



