!, NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 407 



riiartin-boxes, hollow in trees, and, in fact, they are found nesting in 

 every conceivable cavity or crevice. The nest is composed of a mass 

 of miscellaneous rubbish, sticks, grasses, hay and other convenient 

 materials. If a box or cavity holds half a peck the little birds will fill 

 it full. The nesting season begins early in May, and two or three 

 broods are generally reared. Mr. L. O. Pindar, of Hickman, Kentucky,, 

 informs me that he saw a pair of these birds nesting on the ground 

 under the floor of a barn, which was elevated four or five inches, and 

 another pair had their nest in a paper bag full of hops, hanging in a 

 neighbor's porch. It has been found nesting in the skulls of horses and 

 oxen lying in grassy fields. Mr. George B. Sennett and Dr. B. H.Warren 

 found a pair breeding in a Kingfisher's hole in a sand-bauk, near Erie, 

 Pennsylvania, August i, 1888.* 



The eggs are white, so thickly dotted with reddish-brown as to 

 nearly conceal the ground- color with a light tinge of purple ; they are 

 nearly spherical to oblong-oval in shape. The eggs are usually seven^ 

 sometimes nine, measuring .64X.52, with great variations in thi& 

 respect. 



721a. Troglodytes aedon parkmanil (Aud.) [63a.] 



Parkman's 'Wren- 



Hab. Western United States, east to the Mississippi Valley (Minnesota, Illinois, etc.), south intc 

 Mexico. 



According to Mr. J. A. Allen, the tTue parkmaniz is a Northwest 

 coast form, typically represented in the coast region of Oregon and 

 Washington Territory, and less typically southward along the coast 

 to Lower California, f The smaller and paler form, T. aedon aztecus^ 

 Baird, is the one now given as inhabiting Western United States (ex- 

 cept the Pacific coast), east to Illinois, etc., south into Mexico. 



The nesting, eggs, and entire general habits of parkmanii corres- 

 pond exactly with those of the House Wren of the East. Mr. Walter 

 E. Bryant states that Parkman's Wren has been known to build in the 

 |Skull of a horse, which had been placed in a fruit tree, in the nests of 

 Cliff Swallows, and within an old shoe lodged in a tree. 



722. Troglodytes Memalis Vieill [65.] 



Winter 'Wren. 



Hab, Eastern North America, breeding from northern border of the United States northward; win- 

 tering from its southern breeding limit southward. 



The Winter Wren breeds from Northern United States northward. 

 A number of records are at hand of its breeding in Southern New 

 York, in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont. The late Dr. Wheaton 

 took young birds of this species in Central Ohio whose plumage indi- 



*Cf. Sennett, Auk, VI, 76. 



