The Western Martin 



it is of necessity "fairly common" 1 where it is found at all, being a sociable 

 bird, one who has traversed the State counts up with dismay the "record 

 stations," and concludes that it is quite the rarest of the swallows — in 

 aggregate, I should say not above one ten-thousandth of the total formed 

 by our seven species. 



Curiously enough, our Martin is chiefly found in its native fast- 

 nesses, — a pine tree riddled and deserted by Lewis Woodpeckers affording 

 it shelter on the banks of Eagle Lake; a doughty oak back in the hills 

 beyond Paso Robles ; or both pines and oaks together on the lower ridges 

 of the San Jacinto range. In such situations the birds seem to be quite 

 dependent for their lodgings upon the services of the larger woodpeckers; 

 and it may be a scarcity of these necessary accommodations, or perhaps 

 an unwillingness on the part of the woodpeckers to rent them, which 

 has kept the species down. 



April ist is the earliest date I have for the arrival of the Martins 

 in California, and a week later is nearer the average; but Mr. Belding 

 has a record of March 1st (1879) for Stockton, and half a dozen others 

 for the first week in March. Their movements depend largely upon the 

 weather; and even if they have come back early, they are willing to mope 

 indoors when the weather is chilly or disagreeable. The Martins feed 

 exclusively on insects, and are thus at the mercy of a backward season. 

 Not only flies and gnats are consumed, but moths, wasps, grasshoppers, 

 dragon-flies, and some of the larger predatory beetles as well. 



The birds mate soon after arrival; and for a home, if in town, they 

 select some crevice or hidey-hole about a building. A cavity left by a 

 missing brick is sufficient, or a station on the eave-plate of a warehouse. 

 Old nests are renovated, and new materials are brought in, — straw, 

 string, and trash for the bulk of the nest, and abundant feathers for 

 lining. Sometimes the birds exhibit whimsical tastes. Mr. S. F. Rath- 

 bun, of Seattle, found a nest which was composed entirely of wood shav- 

 ings mixed with string and fragments of the woven sheath which covers 

 electric light wires. The haunts of men are in no wise shunned, and 

 there is no reason why houses should not be provided for the Martins, 

 as is the custom in the older East. Even the Indian sagamores of the 

 Five Nations used to hang out gourds for their feathered friends; and if 

 our western aborigines, the Diggers and the Piutes, were less thoughtful, 

 we shall have to work a little harder, that is all. x^rchitects not yet 

 overawed by fear of the English Sparrow sometimes exhibit a com- 

 mendable negligence and leave recesses which please the eye as well as 

 the birds. Thus, an observer in Pasadena 2 noted the successive occu- 

 pation by Martins of the eaves of the Maryland Hotel until they 



1 "Fairly common summer resident, locally" — Willett: " Birds of the Pacific Slope of Southern California." p. 89. 



2 A son of Geo. Priestly. See "Condor," Vol. XL, p. 208. Also "The Oologist." Vol. XXXII., No. 9. p. 153- 



521 



