aioi iaa acii ai a 
1876.] - Loblogy. 49 
are sometimes hatched as early as March 15th, but never having met 
with eggs, I was not aware until this year that such is their usual habit 
near San Francisco. The extensive cultivation of Australian trees may, 
perhaps, have helped to make this early nesting more general, as in this 
climate such trees, as well as other subtropical garden plants, are covered 
with flowers, supplying winter fdod for these humming-birds more plen- 
tifully than the native plants formerly did. But whether a “new de- 
parture ” or not, my boy (eight!years old) found three nests of this 
species within a stone’s throw of the house, between February 15th and 
_ 20th, all on low branches of the Eucalyptus (or Australian blue gum), 
between ten and twenty feet above the ground. These trees are cov- 
ered most of the winter with large flowers, in which there is much 
honey, and the acacias of several species, also blooming at this season 
(like most antipodal trees), have been very attractive to the hummers, as 
well as to minute insects on which they feed. They have likewise utilized 
the long, silky stamens of some acacias in building their nests, though 
still using chiefly the down from various native herbs, the platanus, wil- 
low, etc., besides going a long distance to find lichens to adorn the nests 
outside, although there are none of these parasites on their favorite gum- 
trees. , 
I have since seen another nest built on a densely-leaved twig of a 
Monterey cypress, adding to the variety of locations before described, 
and this was a few yards only from a noisy hotel on the main road. To 
add to the completeness of their history I watched one nest to note time 
of incubation, and found it sixteen or eighteen days at least [while the 
Eastern species needs but thirteen. — Brewer]. One brood was hatched 
before March Ist, another on the 5th. This is while only two truly 
summer visitors have arrived, the Hirundo bicolor (January 30th) and 
Selasphorus rufus, the latter (Nootka hummer) first seen February 16th, 
but does not build until April or May. 
In the nest observed, one young died, but the other was fledged and 
left it on March 30th, quite able to make short excursions for food in fif- 
teen days. I had seen fledged young ones about the Eucalyptus trees 
several days earlier, so that they must hatch in many nests as early as 
March Ist. Three cold rains occurred during the development of the one 
I watched. During all the time of development both of eggs and young 
there have been white frosts at night and fresh, piercing cold winds dur- 
ing the day. As withthe Nootka Hummers the females perform the task 
of hatehing and feeding the young entirely by themselves, the males dis- 
appearing from the lowlands and gardens after the eggs are laid, and re- 
tiring among the richer flowers of the mountain cafions. 
My correction of Nuttall’s account of the nest of this species is con- 
firmed by these specimens, which are much larger than that he describes, 
being 1.75 inch, instead of 1.25 wide, etc. But as he caught the female 
on the nest, with the eggs in it, and describes the bird (as Zrochilus icte- 
0. 1. 4 
