92 



THE OOLOGIST. 



at him. Then we went to a doctor 

 who is quite a bird crank himself. He 

 told me the same and not until then did 

 I believe it. Some of my friends (col- 

 lectors) do not agree Avith me and I 

 would, therefore, like to have the 

 opinion of the majority." 



Under date of April 7th, Clarence A. 

 Smith, of Gainesville, Fla., writes: 

 "Nesting iij just begun here. Logger- 

 head Shrikes have finished building and 

 ■.Mockingbirds have just begun. I took 

 a set of three Red-bellied Woodpeckers 

 to-day, also observed a pair of Red- 

 headed Woodpeckers making a cavity 

 in a dead pine." 



On the 19th ult., ye Associate Editor 

 and E. J. Botsford, while enjoying a 

 ramble near Medina, found, in a dense 

 thicket of underbrush in a marsh, and 

 impaled on a sharpened twig of one of 

 the bushes, a Robin's head entire 

 Only a few rods away was an orchard, 

 in which a completed nest of the White- 

 rumped Shrike had just been found 

 with the birds near by, and to them 

 was probably traceable the Robin's 

 tragedy. 



W. A. Merritt, Washington, D. C, 

 reports some early sets of Crow's eggs, 

 as follows: 



March 29, 1890._ A set of four eggs of 

 Corvus frugivorus . 



April 5th. A set of five eggs of Cor- 

 vus frugivorus and one of five eggs of 

 Corims ossifragus. 



Percy Smith, Simcoe, Out., writes: 

 "A few days ago we noticed that the 

 vegetables in our cellar were being 

 gnawed, presumably by rats. I set a 

 trap, but caught a beautiful Flying 

 Squirrel. Length, 10 inches; extent, 8 

 inches. I made a skin of him. As 

 these little fellows have been in the 

 cellar other winters, I think that they 

 must hibernate in such places." 



Prairie Warbler. 



{Dendroica discolor.) 



This bird rarely breeds here, but on 

 the 21st of May, 1888, I had the good 

 luck to find one of their nests. 



While passing through an old field 

 that had grown up to a thicket of sassa- 

 fras and other bushes eight to ten feet 

 high, I was attracted by the bird's 

 peculiar chirp. On looking around, I 

 espied the nest in a small hickory bush, 

 about three feet from the ground. 



The nest contained one egg then, but 

 in four days, the set of live eggs was 

 complete. 



The nest was a model of neatness, 

 very compact and deep, measuring on 

 the inside If inches deep by H inches 

 across. It is composed of grass, bark, 

 lint and down, from the milk-weed; 

 lined with horse haii", feathers and tine 

 grass. 



The eggs measured .63 x .46 and Avere 

 slightly tinged with greenish, speckled 

 with chestnut, with lighter shell mark- 

 ings in the form of a wreath, around the 

 large end. 



F. C. POINDEXTER, 



Bartle, Indiana. 



Rose-breasted Grosbeak. 



I have not seen much in the OoLO- 

 GiST about the Rose-breasted Grosbeak 

 {Zamelodia ludoviciana) and as it has 

 been my luck to find several nests, I 

 write this article hoping it will be of 

 interest to the readers. This Inrd is not- 

 ed for its voice and beauty. It is plump 

 and round. The male's head and neck 

 are black, bill whitish, wings and tail 

 white and black, the breast and undei- 

 wing coverts, rosy or carmine red. 

 The female's wings and neck are 

 blackish and olive brown; the under 

 wing coverts are yellowish. The nest 

 is of a shallow structure, made of 

 twigs, etc., and is rather oval in shape; 

 the eggs are three to five in number. 



