BIRDS 307 



The birds are scarce about Elizabeth Bay on Albemarle, for there is 

 little vegetation here outside of the mangrove swamps, and, as said 

 before, these salt swamps appear to be uncongenial to them. On the 

 north side of Perry Isthmus, however, there is plenty of vegetation all 

 over the side and about the base of the mountain there situated, and 

 the birds were found abundantly at this place. We were here during 

 February and it was noticed that Geos;piza fuliginosa parvula uttered 

 notes very strikingly different from anything heard elsewhere. The 

 song was so very much like that of the swamp Geospiza heliobates 

 that when we entered the mangrove swamp along the shore where 

 the birds were singing, we supposed we were listening to this bird. 

 Afterwards, however, a specimen in the act of singing the song was 

 taken outside of the swamp and found to be Geospiza fuliginosa 

 parvula. The song itself consisted of a repetition of a single note and 

 resembled somewhat t'-w'er-t'wer-t'wer-t'w'er. Each note had a 

 double sound, the t being slightly separated, as if composed of a 

 bisyllabic sound condensed into a single syllable. Three or four 

 was the usual number of repetitions of the note. 



During the time we were here the birds were nesting both in the 

 mangrove swamps along the shore and in the trees and bushes inland. 

 One male was noticed in a swamp reconstructing an old nest with ma- 

 terial that he took from another old nest in a neighboring tree. While 

 at work he constantly uttered in loud clear tones the song just de- 

 scribed. He worked, however, very interruptedly, for he spent a 

 great deal of time in flying about in a very excited manner from tree 

 to tree, acting just as if he was living in a state of such happy expecta- 

 tion that he could scarcely contain his emotions. At intervals a female 

 came around to inspect the nest. She was always very quiet and 

 showed no excitement at all, very calmly examining the nest, but 

 paying almost no attention to the male. She, however, or perhaps 

 the delightful hope of her approval of the nest, was very evidently the 

 sole cause of the male's exuberance of spirit. Whenever she appeared 

 he flew about wildly, first to the nest and then to some neighboring 

 branch and back again to the nest, all the time uttering with greatest 

 energy the song described. Very curiously, however, he did not fly 

 about the female nor keep close to her nor even look toward her more 

 than in any other direction. Whenever he alighted anywhere he held 

 his body in a depressed attitude and kept his wings rigidly half spread 

 in a drooping oblique position, all the time turning partly from one 

 side to the other. If the female went into the nest he went in also, or 

 at least to the nest, and then either one or both of them uttered low 



