40 Bulletin No. ij. 



bridge, Mass.,* to Mr. William T. Davis for an article on " Staten Island 

 Crows and their Roosts," f to Mr. O. Widmann again for a description of 

 "A Winter Robin Roost in Missouri," \ and to Abby F. C. Bates for ac- 

 quaintance with "A Swallow Roost at Waterville, Maine. "§ In the 

 scanty literature at my disposal I can find no other account of roosts, 

 except by casual mention. 



Conspicuous and well known as the Bronzed Grackle is to nearly every 

 one, he has received almost no attention from students of birds, if we 

 are to judge from printed accounts of his roosting habits during the sum- 

 mer season. I find mention made of such a habit in Vol. I, p. 333, of 

 Wilson' s American Ornithology, and casual mention in the writings of 

 many subsequent authors, but nothing approaching a careful study of it. 

 Some tell us that these gatherings are in the shade trees of villages, 

 towns or cities, others that the birds still cling to their primitive habit of 

 passing the night in thick woods or swamps. There is, therefore, nothing 

 unique in this gathering in the heart of Oberlin. In this part of the 

 state the grackles seem to prefer such places to the country. In the hope 

 of throwing a little more light upon the life history of a species already 

 so well known, I may be permitted to discuss somewhat in detail this 

 favorably situated roost. 



The grackles have had a summer rendezvous somewhere in the village 

 of Oberlin for no one knows how many years. There is a fairly accurate 

 record of them as far back as early in the eighties, but earlier than that 

 recollection is at fault. Their habit of roosting in the trees whose 

 branches overhang a public or private walk has brought them into ill 

 repute, and they have been driven from place to place in the village by 

 irate property owners until forced into the campus, which is virtually the 

 public square. Here they have enjoyed comparative peace, because it is 

 everybody's and therefore nobody's business to drive them out. Inde- 

 pendence Day, with its deafening din and showers of fiery hail, has been 

 full of terrors for the grackles, but they have endured it all for the sake 

 of the old habit. 



There is nothing about the situation of Oberlin that would seem to make 

 it a more desirable place in which to spend the night, in the eyes of a 

 grackle, than any one of the many remnants of woods in the immediate 

 vicinity. The village lies in a plain region 250 feet above lake Erie, cut 



*Summer Robin Roosts, Ank, Vol. VII, October, 1890, p. 360. 



tStaten Island Crows and their Roosts, Auk, Vol. XI, July, 1894, p. 228. 



+A Winter Robin Roost in Missouri, etc., Auk, Vol. XII, January, 1895, p. 1. 



§A Swallow Roost at Waterville, Maine, Auk, Vol. XII, January, 1895, p. 48. 



