356 GREEN-CRESTED FLYCATCHER. 



tiful mosaic of gray, green, and glaucuous crustaceous lichens, so common on the trunks 

 of old trees and fence-rails. Usually the branch to which it is securely attached is also 

 covered with the same kinds of lichens, so that scarcely the trained eye of the close 

 observer can detect it from below. It is three inches in diameter, and one and a half 

 inches high. The cavity is two and a half inches wide and one inch deep. "The eggs 

 themselves are extremely handsome, having a rich but delicate cream-colored ground, 

 and ornamented by a wreath round the larger end of rich madder-brown, purple, and 

 lilac spots." (Ridgway.) The nest is usually pl£|,ced from fifteen to twenty feet from 

 the ground, but I have found one scarcely higher than six feet. Many are placed as 

 high as forty and fifty feet. All the nests found by me were built on horizontal limbs, 

 but a few were "saddled" on green boughs of apple trees. Often the domicile is placed in 

 a tree very near a dwelling, but it is rarely discovered by those that are passing to and 

 fro underneath the tree. 



NAMES: Wood Pewee, Pewee, Pewee Flycatcher. 

 SCIENTIFIC NAMES: Muscicapa virens Linn. (1766). Tyranaus rirens Nutt. (1S40). CONTOPUS 



VIRENS Cab. (1855). Muscicapa querala Tieill. (\887). Afuscicapa rapax Wils. (1810). 

 DESCRIPTION : "Upper parts, sides of head, neck and breast, dark olivaceous-brown, the latter rather paler, 

 the head darker. A narrow white ring round the eye. The lower parts, pale yellowish, deepest on 

 the abdomen; across the breast tinged with ash. This pale ash sometimes occupies the whole of the 

 breast, and even occasionally extends up to the chin. It is also sometimes glossed with olivaceous. 

 The wings and tail, dark brown ; generally deeper than in Sayornis pbcebe. Two narrow bands across 

 the wings, the outer edge of first primary and of the secondaries and tertials, dull white. The edges 

 of the tail-feathers like the back ; the outer one scarcely lighter. Upper mandible, black ; the lower, 

 yellow, but brown at the tip.— Length, 6.15 inches; wing, 3.50; tail, 3.05." (B. B. & R., II, p. 357.) 



Western Wood Pewee, Contopus richardsonii Baird. This species is numerous 

 in Arizona and other western States, being found from the Plains to the Pacific coast 

 and north to the Saskatchewan. "Though generally distinguishable from the Eastern 

 Wood Pewee," says Dr. J. A. Allen, "on comparison of dried skins, it is more easily 

 recognized by the diiference in its notes and breeding habits. The nest is built in the 

 forks of a small branch, instead of being 'saddled' on a horizontal limb, like that of the 

 eastern bird. It is neat and compact, resembling both in position and general form, 

 that of the Least Flycatcher of the Atlantic States. Its notes are harsh and less varied 

 than those of its eastern relative, lacking almost entirely the plaintive character so 

 distinctive of the latter." 



Green-crested Flycatcher. 



Empidonax virescens Brewster. 



Plate XXXIII. Fig. 6.* 



I^HE small Flycatchers or Empidonaces of this country are exceedingly difficult to 

 distinguish, and even the expert ornithologist m sometimes puzzled while examin- ■ 

 ing a large series of dry skins. Wilson, Audubon, and Nuttall, the founders of American 

 ornithology, were not aware of the existence of four different species in the Eastern 



• Thia bird was formerly known as Empldoaax. avadicas. 



