THE OOLOQI8T 



115 



ing pha'larope nests amid the longer 

 grasses is certain to meet with dis- 

 appointment. Tiny bogs, with scanty 

 growth, are much favored; and, still 

 more, the areas whereon naught is 

 growing but a tiny, five-inch rush. 

 Herein, the nests are placed. They 

 are usually real nests, full half inch 

 in thickness. They are of grassy and 

 other fine materials, and the entire 

 fabric is fairly well sunken into the 

 soft meadow soil. Seldom is the site 

 where water stands. 



The Montana Red-wing is quite as 

 interesting as his more plebean con- 

 gener of the southern and mid- 

 northern marshes. His voice is of a 

 rather different quality, and especially 

 in the alarm notes uttered when one 

 nears the nest. In no wise are these 

 Red-wings so abundant as the common 

 Red-wing is with us. During ten days 

 of search for nests of the Yellow Rail 

 I found, probably about fifteen nests 

 of Montana Red-wings only. 



These, in location and make-up, were 

 decidedly uniform. They were, as I 

 found them, almost invariably ob- 

 conical; were always fairly sessile, 

 amid rather short, fine meadow grass; 

 and were made, of course, of marsh- 

 materials, laid in wet. Few nests 

 wer raised above the ground level. I 

 found a few that were hardly swathed 

 to any appreciable degree to the sur- 

 rounding grasses. The small series of 

 eggs taken involved some exceedingly 

 beautiful variances. One set contained 

 eggs that were fairly specked with a 

 fev/ hair lines and most delicate stipp- 

 lings while one set of very small 

 and narrow eggs are hardly marked 

 anywhere, save at the apex. (One egg 

 of this exquisite set has just a tiny, 

 sprawly blotch of black at the very 

 crown. One egg of a set of five bears 

 much of the faint, diffused tint of 

 purplish grey so characteristic of the 

 eggs of the Great-tailed Grackle, while 



the magnificent markings are of the 

 most delicate fairly wine-colored 

 sepia-umber. A single (aborted) egg 

 found lying on the sand at a lake mar- 

 gin fringed by rushes was totally un- 

 like any red-wing egg I have ever 

 seen. It was of a pale blue and wa's 

 obscurely marked with clouded umber 

 spots, all coalescing at the apex. The 

 egg, moreover, was equal ended. One 

 ventures here a suggestion in regard 

 to series collecting. In cases where 

 but a single egg of a set shows any 

 wide variation it does seem a pity to 

 brea'k up the laying. Why not then 

 take just the one unusual egg and de- 

 pend on later findings for the gradual 

 assembling of a fairly representative 

 series? 



P. B. Peabody, 

 Blue Rapids, Kansas. 



Migration Notes 



The fall of 1919, in the Ozark moun- 

 tains, about the section of Marionville, 

 Mo., began early and was very irregu- 

 larly drawn out over a much longer 

 space than usual. The first thing to 

 be noted is that on account of the 

 drouth, the summer residents had be- 

 come transient. There was no surety 

 of their whereabouts. During the last 

 few days of August we had a change 

 of weather which was sufficient to 

 turn the attention of wild life towards 

 fall. 



During the last few days of August 

 and the first few days of September 

 the birds began to assemble and re- 

 appear in greater numbers than I had 

 seen for months. Then during the 

 whole of September there was a steady 

 flight, slow to be sure, but they were 

 rioving. This flight consisted of 

 Robins, Grackles, Blackbirds, Jays, 

 small Sparrows, Bluebirds, Cowbirds, 

 Flickers, Woodpeckers, Kingbirds, 

 Blue Gray Gnatcatchers and other 



