The Crossbills 



should pluck me by the sleeve and ask, "What happened after that?" 

 I will add, sadly, — The next boat carried me back to Seattle. 



In choice of nesting dates the Crossbill is probably the most erratic 

 of all northern birds. Having, as it does, a regionally variable, but 

 locally dependable, food supply, these birds nest whenever and wherever 

 the notion seizes them — it may be in January, it may be in October. 

 Indeed, it will not be surprising to learn that Crossbills have nested in 

 every month of the year. The quasi-migrations, for which- the Crossbills 

 are notorious, are evidently determined by the abundance or failure of 

 the cone crop, whether pine or fir. Now the fruiting of the conifers is, 

 as every one knows, an exceedingly irregular matter. There is always 

 something doing somewhere, but your evergreen has learned to defy the 

 seasons; so, of course, the Crossbill's calendar has been turned topsy 

 turvy. Communal life, therefore, is maintained the year around, in 

 spite of the occasional defection of love-lorn couples; and there is nothing 

 in the appearance of a flock of Crossbills in April to suggest that other 

 such are dutifully nesting. 



The nest of the Crossbill is said to resemble somewhat that of the 

 California Purple Finch, but it is more compactly built, and much more 

 heavily lined. The female exhibits a tragic devotion to duty, once 

 confessed, and in some cases collectors have actually had to lift the bird 

 off her eggs in order to examine them. In one classical instance, recorded 

 by Dr. Brewer, of a nest taken early in March, the bird was not only 

 several times forcibly removed, but she insisted upon resuming her place 

 upon the nest as it was being carried down from the tree. 



Of the distribution of our California Crossbills much yet remains 

 to be learned. If our breeding form is bendirei, then it is safe to say that 

 the birds have little occasion to leave the limits of the State, or even of 

 the mountains, in winter. They are always to be found somewhere in 

 the Sierras and in the San Bernardinos. Their occasional appearance in 

 the lesser ranges, provided always that they are more or less pine-clad, 

 is safely predicable, but it is not known whether they breed in such cir- 

 cumstances, or where. The most exceptional instance of recent times 

 was reported from Santa Cruz Island, where Messrs. A. B. Howell and 

 Adriaan van Rossem found them in numbers in April, 191 1, (and up to 

 May 2nd), and where they believed them to be breeding. I saw nothing 

 of them in April, 1915, nor have any of our recent parties (1916, 1918, 

 1919, 1922) observed them. 



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