Birds oe Indiana. 903 



tshayia-too-too, tshippe-tshippe-too-too." I have obsKrVed tkem 

 mating as early as May 3 with us, and have foxmd the nest completed 

 May 30, and young June 1. Mr. L. T. Meyer has reported yoimg in 

 Lake County May 30, and Mrs. J. L. Hine frfesh eggs from Sedan 

 June 1. The nest is the finest bird structure found with us. It is a 

 pensile, purse-shaped composition, into which strings, fibres, tow, hair 

 •and various other pliable materials enter. Maj.Bendire says it requires 

 from five to eight days to build the nest. One egg is laid daily, and 

 one brood reared each season. Incubation lasts about fourteen days, 

 and it is said the female performs most of that duty. It is said the 

 young are fed upon insects. This is partly true. The past season 

 a pair of these birds built their nest in a fir tree in my yard, on a limb 

 reaching over an alley. I observed the old birds, when the yoUng were 

 hatched, catching what seemd to be insects for them. They were 

 also frequent visitors to my strawberry beds, eating and carryiiig away 

 what they wanted. This was kept up until late in June. 



June 25 my boys found that one of the young was fastened in the 

 nest. I cut off the limb and found one leg entangled in the strings. 

 It had been there some time, as the muscles were shriveled and the 

 leg useless. The bird was lively and voracious. From the stains on 

 its feathers, and the droppings in the nest, it was plfiin to be seen 

 that a large part of its food for some time had been strawberries. 



The attractive song of first appearance gives place to a shorter one 

 about June 1. "Who-ee, here-we-are," or "who-ee-who-ee-who-ee- 

 who" it seems to say. As the days pass by, this is shortened by two or 

 three syllables. The last syllable is always short and emphatic. The 

 staccato effect is very characteristic. The rattling call, "kur-r-r-t," 

 still continues, as when it first came. Through June the songs get 

 less frequent. The last I heard — ^a fragment — was June 35, this year. 

 July 24, I again heard its song. The performance was like that of 

 mid-June, but finer. This was continued into the early part of Au- 

 gust. August 9, 1 heard one singing little parts .of songs, and the last I 

 heard of these attractive birds was a "kur-r-r-t," August 12. 



They begin to leave late in June, and through July and August but 

 few remain with us. Some years none axe seen after the middle of 

 August. Others, they remain well into September, and Prof. W. P. 

 Shannon reported one from Greensburg, October 1, 1896. That is 

 the latest record for the State. In 113 stomachs examined, caterpil- 

 lars constituted 34 per cent, of the food. The other insects found 

 were beetles, chiefly clickbeetles, the larvae of which are very de- 

 structive, bugs, ants, wasps, grasshoppers and some spiders. Vegeta- 

 ble material was found to be a little over 16 per cent, of the food 



