Rusty Blackbird 315 
Breeding commences about the beginning of June in 
the central part of the State; Aiken found a nest nearly 
complete on June 6th, in El Paso co., while Dille (03) 
gives June 12th as the average date for fresh eggs about 
Denver. The nest, a very common object in cotton-wood 
trees in and around Colorado Springs, is pensile, being 
suspended from the horizontal branch of a tree at a 
good height, twelve to twenty feet above the ground, 
and is often quite inaccessible. The nest is woven of 
shreds of wild flax, of the inner bark of various trees 
and such-like material, and is lined with horsehair, wool, 
vegetable down or even moss. The eggs, five or six 
in number, are elongate and whitish in colour, marked 
with fine hair-lines and streaks and blotches of brown. 
They measure ‘94 x *63. The female alone incubates, 
and only one brood is raised. 
Genus EUPHAGUS. 
Medium-sized birds—wing about 4-5 to 5-0—with short bills, and with 
a distinctly down-curved culmen; wing long and pointed, the ninth 
primary always shorter than the seventh and eighth, usually between 
the sixth and fifth; tail long, about } the length of wing, rounded, 
but not plicate; tarsus stout and strong, distinctly longer than the 
middle toe and claw. Plumage of the males glossy black, of the 
females dusky brown. 
Only two species, ranging chiefly over the temperate regions of North 
America, are recognised ; both occur in Colorado. 
Key or THE SPECIES. 
A. Bill slender, its depth at the nostril less than 4 the length of 
the mandible ; plumage faintly glossy. E. carolinus, p. 315. 
B. Bill stouter, its depth at the nostril about equal to 4 the 
length of the mandible ; plumage more strongly glossed. 
E. cyanocephalus, p. 316. 
Rusty Blackbird. Huphagus carolinus. 
A.O.U. Checklist no 509—Colorado Records—H. G. Smith 86, 
p. 284; Thorne 88, p. 264; Morrison 89, p. 148; Osburn 93, p. 212: 
Cooke 97, p. 95 (Scolecophagus carolinus). 
