The Lazuli Bunting 



struggling auto made explosive comment upon our hill, a perfect cascade 

 of brightly plumaged birds, all males, boiled up from the ground. 



The secret of Lazuli Bunting's nesting — at least in southern Cali- 

 fornia — may be told all in a breath — Artemisia heterophylla! There you 

 have it! Search the clumps of this broad-leafed sage, or "mugwort," 

 as it grows to a height of three or four feet along the banks of streams, 

 or upon half-shaded hillsides, and you will be astonished at the harvest 

 of "Lazzes" it will yield. In a sea- 

 son's desultory nesting, that of 1920, 

 at Santa Barbara, I found nineteen 

 occupied nests of the Lazuli Bunt- 

 ing. Of these, fourteen were in pure 

 stands of A. heterophylla; two in 

 mixed stands; two in poison oak; 

 and one in a blackberry tangle. The 

 nest, a rather bulky but often tidy 

 affair, of bark-strips, hemp, and 

 dried grasses, lined with fine grass or 

 horsehair, is lashed to the upright 

 clustering stems of the mugwort ; or, 

 more rarely, and in mixed cover, is 

 supported from below by transverse 

 stalks and vines. The female slips 

 off quietly, often unnoticed, and the 

 passerby would not suspect the pres- 

 ence of a nest; but a loitering oolo- 

 gist soon elicits an anxious twisp, or 

 twissup from the skulking bird. If 

 he does not heed that warning, the 

 female will presently summon her 

 mate, and both birds will berate him 

 soundly. Amcena means pleasant, 

 but you could hardly expect an anx- 

 ious mother to practice the amenities 

 while a brute of a man is fingering 

 her babies-to-be and speculating upon their possible degree of freshness. 

 The male, on the other hand, soon tires of saying unpleasant things, and 

 will try your heart with a bit of a song instead. 



Taken in Santa Barbara 



Photo by the Author 



A FURTIVE INSPECTION— BY A FEMALE LAZULI 

 BUNTING 



41 T 



