TEXAS NATURE OBSERVATIONS AND REMINISCENCES. 317 



cactus wren, as its name implies, 

 is a typical cactus jungle bird, 

 and its body feathers and its tail 

 in particular, is very beautifully 

 marked with snow-white dots and 

 stripes, and the beautiful spotted 

 tailfeathers are spread out like a 

 fan in their movements from 

 one cactus bush to another, 

 or in flying and running along the 

 ground. Usually these birds built a 

 very large nest between some cac- 

 tus leaves, and occassionally two 

 or three can be found in ine cac- 

 tus bunch, and I have met some 

 during hutiting trips fully two 

 and one-half feet long; and all 

 such nests are usually built of dry 

 limbs of the yellow bloomingbroom 

 weed. The nest seen on this photo 

 was over a foot long and consisted 

 entirely of broom weeds — with 

 some of its small yellow, flowers 

 still quite green; and its inside, 

 funnel-shaped cavity was snugly 

 out-lined with tiny feathers. Once 

 year ago, at the Leona, hills I met 

 numbers of such cactus nests, and 

 one in particular was of much in- 

 terest as its inside mold was out- 

 lined with fine soft feathers and a 

 large quantity of rabbit-fur, and 

 near its entrance a piece of dry 

 skin of a rattlesnake was inter- 

 woven in the nest body. W. C. 

 Schulze and some others were 

 present when I called their atteu; 

 tion also to this unusual wrens 

 nest. 



Such freaks in nature are oc- 

 casionally met with during hunt- 

 ing trips and I recollect hov/, only 

 a few weeks ago, I found this 

 nest of some other weaver-bird in 

 which a f ieldmouse with five 

 young ones (about one inch long 

 and yet blind) were found. It hap- 

 pend near the Mission "Bspada" 

 and I showed the nest to my com- 

 panions and-neighbors, Max Men'-- 

 ger and A. Haubold. It was a 

 beautiful, oval-shaped nest of 



some weaver-bird, inside a dense 

 conglommorated mass of vines; 

 and, though the breeding season 

 of birds was about over, mere cu- 

 riosity tempted me to investigate 

 this nest, and on closer inspection 

 the long tail of a field mouse was 

 seen protruding inside the nest en- 

 trance, and on still closer inspec- 

 tion, the five young blind mice 

 were seen. The nest was situated 

 about five feet above the ground, 

 and nearly in the center of a large 

 broad bush close to an overhang- 

 ing tree covered with the foliage 

 of mustang grape vines. 

 # * * 

 . In his works on birds of North 

 America, the grcst German or-- 

 nithologist, H. Nehrling, mentions 

 that the ornithologists of Europe, 

 judging only from stuffed speci- 

 mens and unfamiliar with the life- 

 habits of our cactus wren, origin- 

 ally supposed these birds were a 

 sort of tree-climber or woodpeck^ 

 er, -and that even Cassin, in his 

 magnificent v/ork: "Illustrations 

 of the Birds of Texas, California, 

 etc., (1853-1856), illustrated this 

 wren in a climbing, wood-pecker- 

 like posture ; but later Dr. Herman 

 reported having first encountered 

 this bird in Southern California, and 

 he was oe of the first to report in 

 detail of the doings and life-ha- 

 bits of this wren : that, like others 

 of its kind, it penetrated the cac- 

 tus-thickets close to the ground;^ 

 where it also finds its food, con- 

 sisting of all sorts of insects, 

 which it gathers principally from 

 the ground. 



"As a genuine wren, this bird 

 lives close to the grotind in vari- 

 ous types of the cactus-plant, 

 which it penetrates in inimitable 

 mastership, in spite of their fear- 

 ful sharp thorns. They build a 

 large, comfortable nest, similar to 

 - seme other types of wren, in form 

 of a poiich or pocket, resembling 

 somewhat the shape of a flat bot- 



