92 DENIZENS OF THE DESERT 



he found many of the newly made nests of the 

 Abert towhees, Bendire thrashers, and in one 

 instance the nest of the cactus wren, covered 

 with the briUiant yellow blossoms of Baeria, or 

 Sunshine. He was able to find no satisfactory 

 explanation other than that the birds had been 

 attracted by the highly colored flowers and had 

 been induced by their sense of decoration thus 

 to adorn their homes. 



It is always easy to know when the time of 

 nest-building is near, for the cock wren, who 

 all the winter long has been rather monoto- 

 nously keeping to one little ditty, now bursts out 

 into the full melody of his courting song — a 

 song insistent, positive, confident, and full of 

 good cheer, and so different in quality and style 

 from that which formerly came from his throat 

 during winter that it is difficult to believe that a 

 new songster has not appeared with the breezes 

 of spring. All through the year the sprightly 

 rock wrens are about the first birds up in the 

 morning and with the towhees the last to retire 

 at night, and now that they are especially noisy 

 in song you are more than ever aware of their 

 early risings and late retirings. The nesting 



