The Red-winged Blackbirds 



The Redwings of the phoeniceus type do not colonize closely, as do 

 those of the tricolor group. If nests occur within ten or fifteen feet of 

 each other, it is only because the cover is limited. The birds delight 

 rather to scatter, one, say, to every fifty feet or so, that each may have a 

 little freeway, or sphere of influence. Especially at second nesting, which 

 is undertaken late in May or early in June, the birds are apt to deploy 

 into the fields, now grown with weeds. Beds of wild mustard are favorite 

 places of resort and of nest-building. Isolated tussocks of sedge or wire- 

 grass, Kern greasewood even, are not despised. Willows may be resorted 

 to as the swamps dry up; and H. F. Duprey records 1 interesting instances 

 of their nesting in live 

 oak trees. At Los 

 Banos I found that 

 the Redwing nested in 

 April in the cattails 

 and tules, but forsook 

 this cover in May, 

 nesting at this season 

 by preference in the 

 overgrown meadows. 

 Especially numerous 

 were the nests lashed 

 centrally to the stems 

 of growing dock 

 plants. These were 

 sought, apparently, for 

 the shade they afford- 

 ed, and irrespective of 

 the fact that the rising 

 flood waters engulfed 

 many, season by 

 season. 



Few eggs exceed 

 in beauty those of the 

 Red-winged Black- 

 bird. The back- 

 ground is a pale bluish 

 green of great deli- 

 cacy, and upon this 

 occur sharply-defined 

 spots, marblings, 



Taken in Los Angeles County Photo by Donald R. Dickey 



Sept., 1907, pp! 149-152.' " NEST AND EGGS OF THE SAN DIEGO REDWING 



121 



