54 The Wilson Bulletin — No. 83. 



the food was too large for the nestling to swallow, the pa- 

 rent bird sometimes pulled it out of the young bird's mouth, 

 and thrust it in again, repeating this process as many as three 

 times, until the nestling swallowed it. On one visit (No. 336) 

 both parent birds helped to push the food down the nestling's 

 throat. Again if the young did not swallow the food, the 

 parent took it and either broke or shook it into a mass so that 

 it was then easily devoured. The worm brought at visit No. 

 641 was so large that the outline of it was seen through the 

 skin of the neck of the nestling bird. There were times, also, 

 when the young quarrelled over the food ; for example at visit 

 No. 272, two of the young grabbed the food and pulled back 

 and forth until the larger one got it. The parent birds in 

 feeding would also try one nestling and if it did not respond 

 properly he would try another, and sometimes go back to 

 the first one again. On July 10 at 13 :36 the female brought 

 some food and tried to feed red, but the nestling did not take 

 it; then the female left and soon returned, but still red would 

 not respond, so the female left the nest, carrying away the 

 food. A very unusual performance occurred on visit No. 398, 

 when the parent birds came to the nest carrying a large yel- 

 lowish worm between them, which they broke into three 

 pieces and fed to the young. 



The identification of the food was very difficult because of 

 its minuteness. Table II shows the distribution of food per 

 day along with a somewhat indefinite classification. There 

 were periods when the male and female brought the same 

 kind of food during a number of consecutive visits, which 

 may have been due to the fact that at times the parent birds 

 traveled together while feeding, as was seen during a short 

 observation. This was especially true of the green worms. 



