STEPHENS'S WHIP-POOR-WILL. 153 



favorite resorts seem to be the rocky sides of canyons. The remnants of the 

 eggshells found by Mr. Fowler (the lower half), which he kindly sent me for 

 examination, are uniformly pale cream colored and apparently unspotted ; and the 

 egg of this species is evidently but slightly marked. He writes me: "The eggs 

 were deposited on a bed of oak leaves by the side of a large rock; there 

 was no nest excepting the bare leaves, which had been hollowed out slightly; 

 both parents and the two young ones Avere taken and they are now in my col- 

 lection; the latter were covered with light brown down, and were not more than 

 1J inches long." 



There are no eggs of Stephens's Whip-poor-will in the United States 

 National Museum collection, and no specimens are figured. 



54. Phalaenoptilus nuttalli (Audubon). 



POOR-WILL. 



Caprimulgus nuttalli Audubon, Birds of America, VII, 1843, 350, PI. 495. 

 Phalasnoptilus nuttalli Ridgway, Proceedings U. S. National Museum, III, 1880, 5. 

 (B 113, C 266, R 355, C 398, U 418.) 



Geographical range: Western United States, from the Sierra Nevada and the 

 Cascade mountains eastward to southeastern South Dakota, eastern Nebraska, Kansas, 

 the Indian Territory, and eastern Texas; north to eastern Washington, Idaho, Montana, 

 and southern North Dakota; south in winter through eastern Mexico to Guatemala, Cen- 

 tral America. Casual east to Iowa and Missouri. 



The Poor-will or Nuttall's Poor-will, a somewhat smaller species than our 

 eastern Whip-poor-will, is distributed over quite an extensive range, its habitat 

 being mainly confined to the interior, from the eastern borders of the Plains and 

 the Great Basin regions to the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountains on the 

 West. As far as yet known it does not appear to be found north of our border, 

 but it will not surprise me to see it yet recorded from the southern portions of 

 western Assiniboia and Alberta, in the Dominion of Canada, especially as it is 

 known to occur in Montana, the type coming from the upper Missouri River, in 

 that State. Its breeding range is coextensive with its distribution in the United 

 States, where it is chiefly a summer resident; the majority of these birds 

 migrate to the table-lands of eastern Mexico, and many go still farther south to 

 Guatemala. A few, however, winter along our southern border, in the Colorado 

 Desert in southeastern California, as well as in similar localities in southern 

 Arizona, New Mexico, and southwestern Texas. I heard the unmistakable notes 

 of this species early in December, 1872, in the vicinity of my camp on Rillito 

 Creek, near Tucson, Arizona, and again about the middle of February, 1873. 



In some of its habits it differs considerably from the preceding species of 

 this family which are almost entirely confined to the denser woodlands; the 

 Poor-will, however, although frequently found in similar localities, is apparently 

 equally as much at home on the open prairie and the almost barren and arid 

 regions of the interior, which are covered only here and there with stunted 



