SSO Colorado College Publication 



through the winter which br.eed here in the summer and there 

 is no evidence that any wintering birds are from more northern 

 locaHties. In April I meet clean plumaged birds coming north 

 from their winter resort. Flocks of House Finches are seen 

 migrating in autumn; August 13, 1907, I noticed flock after 

 flock passing south along the Fountain at Skinner's six miles 

 south of Colorado Springs. Young birds gather in weedy 

 fields in August where they linger a few days until the autumn 

 moult is completed and then most of them go southward, prob- 

 ably led by old birds. The percentage of these which return in 

 the spring seems to be small. 



I first met with House Finches near Cailon City, April 

 26, 1872 ; a flock of several hundred were sweeping through the 

 valley. In the May following I found 2 or 3 pairs nesting in 

 the pinon hills northeast of there. I found none nesting in 

 those early days in Cafion City, Pueblo, Colorado Springs, or 

 Denver, but at Trinidad, in July, 1872, I first saw them utiliz- 

 ing human habitations. It was many years before the north- 

 ern birds took up with the advance of civilization and made 

 their homes in towns. When I returned to Colorado, in De- 

 cember, 1895, after some years absence, I found them fre- 

 quenting the city. The spring following a pair built their nest 

 in a wistaria vine close under the eaves of my front porch 

 and directly over the steps. They raised a brood and went off 

 with the young as soon as they could fly, and were not seen 

 again until the following spring (1897), when they cleaned 

 and reoccupied the old nest. 



When the young in this nest were half grown the parents 

 built a second nest under my neighbor's porch and while the 

 male was attending the first brood the female raised another. 

 In 1898 the breeding impulse was even stronger. Tlie male 

 was first noticed December 27 of the previous year to come 

 and inspect the old nest. At intervals of ten days he came 

 after that for several weeks before he brought his mate. In 

 March the pair cleaned and relined the old nest and the female 



