432 YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOO. 



Their very compact and warm nests, in the construction of which a considerable quantity 

 of wool was used, were also found around the border. The nests of the Philadelphia 

 Vireo, the Yellow Warbler, the Redstart and the Least Flycatcher were all found in this 

 locality. A pair of Kingbirds had taken up their abode in a small elm standing in the 

 centre. They were the guardians of all the small birds nesting around them. Mourning 

 Doves and Wood Thrushes had also chosen their haunts in the interior of these thickets, 

 it was in this locality that I found the first nest of the Yellow-billed Cuckoo. During 

 June, July and August the very peculiar and striking sounds of this bird were heard 

 almost incessantly. Its common call-note sounding like coobk-cook-cook-cook-cook 

 was daily heard. Another familiar call, given in a rather low tone, was similar to the 

 syllables coo-coo-coo-coo and cow-cow-cow. The long-tailed conspicuous bird with its 

 white underside and grayish-brow^n back, always vanishing before my eyes when I came 

 near its hiding places, was at last detected. After many hours of patient waiting, I 

 saw it plainly and heard its notes close by. It was such a characteristic and mysterious 

 bird that it appeared in my dreams, and its notes haunted me wherever I went. Several 

 days later, in the second week of June, while rambling about in the thickets, I found 

 the bird on its nest, a very slovenly and comparatively small structure w^ith an exceed- 

 ingly small cavity. It was built of sticks and lined w^ith a dense felting of the wool of 

 willow catkins. The bird glided off swiftly and did not show^ any uneasiness w^hile I 

 examined its domicile. The nest contained three greenish-blue or glaucous-blue eggs. 

 Later in the season, and also in the succeeding years, I found other nests, all built in 

 the same manner. The birds were rather common, and their voices were heard until 

 late in August, when they ceased. By the middle of September they left for the South. 

 I found that these Cuckoos in this part of Wisconsin never arrived before the last day« 

 of May. 



Several years later I found the Yellow-billed Cuckoo a rather numerous summer 

 sojourner on the Desplaines and in many other parts of northern Illinois. It was also 

 a rather familiar bird in the Ozark region of south-western Missouri, where it rarely 

 arrived before May 15. There it nested frequently in the apple orchards and Osage 

 orange hedges. In south-eastern Texas, near Houston, and farther west on the West 

 Yegua Creek in Lee Co., I found it more abundant than anywhere else. I discovered its 

 nests usually in thickets overgrown with wild grape-vines, smilax, and trumpet creepers. 

 It made its appearance always when the trees were in full foliage and when eater-pillars, 

 its main food, were abundant, usually about April^ 20. Thus it will be seen that the 

 Yellow-billed Cuckoo has a very extensive range in summer, breeding from the Gulf 

 coast north to the Dominion of Canada, New Brunswick, and Minnesota, and from the 

 Atlantic west to the eastern border of the Plains. In winter it is found abundant in 

 the West Indies, where it is known as the "May Bird," and through eastern Mexico to 

 Costa Rica. Some even winter in southern Florida. 



The Yellow-billed Cuckoo is a well-known bird throughout its summer range, and 

 though comparatively few people know the bird when they chance to see it, many are 

 well acquainted with its characteristic notes. Besides the names already mentioned it 

 is also called "Cow-cow," "Rain Pigeon," "Wood Pigeon," "Indian Hen," and "American 

 Cuckoo." Of late years it has made its appearance even in the city of Milwaukee where 



