290 NESTS AND EGGS OF 



Ohio, exhibit the following sizes: .79x.50, .80x.50, .80x.52, .77x.50, .79x.53. The eggs 

 in a large series range from .74 to .86 in length and from .47 to .55 In breadth. 



424. VATJX'S SWIFT. Chwtura vauxii (Towns.) Geog. Dlst.— Pacific coast 

 of the United States northward to British Columbia; south in winter to Lower Cali- 

 fornia and Mexico. 



This is a lighter colored and smaller species than the Chimney Swift. The 

 habits of the two birds, however, are similar, except that Vaux's Swift Is said only 

 to nest in hollow trees. In various regions of Oregon and in. Washington this species 

 is a common summer resident, where it breeds in May and June, fastening to the in- 

 side walls of hollow tree trunks and stubs the half-saucer-shaped nest of twigs, which 

 is glued together with the bird's saliva. Three to five narrow-elliptical white eggs 

 are deposited, which have an average size of about .72x.50. Very few of this bird's 

 eggs have found their way into collections. 



425. WHITE-THROATED SWIFT. JEronautes melanoleucuS (Baird.) Geog. 

 Dist. — Western United States, from the Black Hills, Northern Wyoming and 

 Southern Montana to the Pacific; south in winter to Guatemala. 



The late Major Bendire states that the range of the "Rock" Swift, as it is com- 

 monly called, does not appear to extend nearly as far north in the mountains of the 

 Pacific coast districts as it does in the Rocky Mountain region, where It is generally 

 distributed throughout suitable localities, from Southern Arizona and New Mexico 

 northward, through Colorado and Wyoming to Montana. The latter, as far as known, 

 marks the northern limits of Its range. Here it was found breeding by Mr. R. S. 

 Williams In small numbers In holes In a limestone cliff on Belt River, about the 

 middle of July, 1881. It was found by Mr. Robert Ridgway to be abundant in the 

 same situations in the Ruby Mountains and In the Easi Humboldt range, but less 

 abundant in the Wasatch Mountains in Utah. The eggs of this species still remain 

 among the special desiderata In oological collections and, according to Bendire 

 (1895), there are none in the U. S. National Museum collection. Mr. Walter B. 

 Bryant gives us the best description of the eggs I have seen. It Is in the September 

 number of the Nidologist for 1894, and Is as follows: "More than a dozen years ago 

 an Imperfect set of five fresh unblown eggs of the White-throated Swift were pre- 

 sented to me by a young man in Contra Costa county (California). They were taken 

 from a nest in a crevice In the back of a tunnel-shaped cave in the side of a cliff 

 about twenty feet above the base. In color the eggs are pure white, narrowly ellip- 

 tical in form, but rather smaller at one end. They measured: .87x.53; .88x.53, 

 .88X.52, .86X.50; the fifth was too much damaged to measure accurately. The eggs 

 were collected on June 6, 1878." 



426. RIVOLI HTTMMINGBIRD. Eugenes fulgens (Swaim.) Geog. Dist.— 

 Southern Arizona and tablelands of Mexico to Nicarauga. 



One of the largest and one of the most handsome Hummingbirds found within the 

 limits of the United States, and it is generally known a's the "Refulgent Humming- 

 bird." Within our limits it is not an altogether common summer resident. It has 

 been obtained In the mountains near the Mexican border, In Arizona, and in the 

 extreme southwestern portion of New Mexico. It was first added to our avifauna by 

 Henshaw, who took a specimen near Fort Grant, Arizona, in September, 1873. The 

 late Major Bendire describes two nests that were taken In the Huachuca Mountalns,- 

 Arizona. One of these, the best preserved one, resembles the nest of the Ruby- 

 throated Hummingbird very closely, but like the bird, is considerably larger. It 

 was fftuad by Mr. L. Miller on June 22, 1894, at an elevation of 7000 feet, saddled on 

 a -walnut branch about ten feet from the ground and contained one young bird nearly 



