418 



LAND BIRDS 



purple that at once attracts attention as he sits sunning 

 himself on a low twig. He is abundant throughout 

 Southern California, but especially so at Tia Juana on 

 the Mexican border and from there to San Diego, among 

 the hills back from the coast. No very definite breeding 

 range can be given him, for he is a capricious little 

 creature, abundant in one locality and rare or unknown 

 in another that seems in climate and surroundings to be 



identical with the 

 one he has chosen. 

 Whether in the low 

 hot valleys about 

 the Colorado Des- 

 ert, or in the Se- 

 quoia National Park 

 at an altitude of 

 nine thousand feet, 

 he builds his home 

 and rears his young 

 in gay indifference to climatic conditions. Nor does he 

 seem to have any especial favorites among the flowers ; 

 and this, I believe, is because his food is so largely insects. 

 I have found him hovering over the bells of the Yucca 

 more frequently than anywhere else, though at Tia 

 Juana he was darting into the blossoms of the species 

 of cactus so commonly domesticated by the Mexicans 

 and used to brew a native drink. On one of these low 

 plants a pair had built their nest in a crotch of the 

 prickly leaves. It was composed of buffy plant down 

 and covered with webs and something that looked like 



429. BlaCk-chinned 

 Hummingbird. 



'^ lAt daintily a few incites 



