224 University of Calif ornia. Publications in Zoology [Vol. 24 



lichens. Attention was drawn to this nest by the sudden flight of the 

 two young birds it contained, wh-en approached too closely. 



During the second week in July a female hummingbird was re- 

 peatedly seen in the vicinity of our camp. On the 14th a male bird 

 was seen going through his courtship flight, associated with this same 

 female, so nesting may have been going on at that date. In the court- 

 ing flight the male bird rose slowly to a height of about sixty feet, then 

 swooped down and swung up again for a very short distance. A 

 diagram showing the course of this evolution would be about the shape 

 of a fishhook. When the lowest point was reached, three or four rasp- 

 ing notes were uttered. The evolution finished, he slowly arose once 

 more and repeated the performance. This was done five or six times, 

 when he lit on a nearby limb. 



For a hummingbird to appear as a menace to a farm crop was a 

 new role for a member of that family, but we heard one such complaint 

 of damage done. Mr. "W. B. Parrott, of Sergief Island, had a large 

 strawberry patch, the fruit of which he marketed in the nearby town 

 of Wrangell. Time and again, so he told us, he had seen a humming- 

 bird dash at one of the bright red berries, apparently under the im- 

 pression that it was a flower, and the bird's bill would be thrust through 

 the fruit, which, of course, was ruined. He had found a number of 

 berries pierced in this way, and was puzzled to account for the damage 

 until he saw a hummingbird in the act. 



Two specimens were preserved (nos. 39813, 89814). These are 

 adult males taken at Glenora, June 29 and July 3, respectively. 



Sayornis sayus (Bonaparte). Say Phoebe 

 Several pairs seen on the upper Stikine River. At Telegraph 

 Creek at least two pairs were domiciled on different houses in the town. 

 On June 6, one pair was seen at work nest building on a beam over the 

 entrance to Hyland's store. At Glenora, June 29, a nest with young 

 was found in one of the deserted houses of the Hudson's Bay Com- 

 pany. A day or two later the birds were gone and search of the adjoin- 

 ing fields failed to disclose their presence ; evidently the brood had at 

 once traveled some distance. 



On August 21 an immature female was collected on Sergief Island, 

 perched on some drift far out on the marshes. This, I believe, is the 

 first time the species has been reported from the coast of southeastern 

 Alaska. It is, of course, a transient, perhaps no more than a straggler 

 into" that region. The bird collected on Sergief Island had probably 

 wandered there from the interior along the Stikine River. 



