Jeby, 1919 NESTING HAUNT OF THE MERRILL SONG SPARROW 151 
The young are not lacking in appetite and at the slightest provocation up 
20 open mouths, each large enough to accommodate almost any size of bug (fig. 
27). While the surroundings teem with insect life it seems an endless task for 
the mother bird to satisfy the hungry brood (fig. 28). A greater portion of the 
food is gleaned on or near the ground. I have noted a female Song Sparrow 
scratching among the dead leaves in search of food similar in manner to a do- 
mestic fowl. 
Until the young birds are fairly strong on the wing a greater part of their 
time is spent among the clumps of sedge and in the dense underbrush where 
they can hide effectually on short notice. The second nests of the season, 
placed in spirea, rosebushes, 
occasional willows and 
clumps of sedge, are more 
compact in form and made 
of whatever species of sedge 
or grass that happens to be 
near, lined with finer mate- 
rial and a few strands of 
horsehair; eggs four or five 
in number, usually four. 
The date of the second 
nesting depends somewhat 
on the date and success of 
the first brood. The second 
set of eggs can be looked for 
any time from the first until 
the third week in June, and 
usually by the second week 
in July the second brood are 
out of the nest and learning 
to care for themselves. 
A female flushed from 
her nest in a clump of sedge 
(Carex rostrata) (fig. 29) 
near the water’s edge, June 
15, disclosed an incomplete 
set of two eggs showing 
Fig. 31. FEMALE MERRILL SONG SPARROW the greatest variance in 
ON SAME NEST AS SHOWN IN PRECEDING coloration (fig. 30). I re- 
PICTURE; PHOTOGRAPHED JUNE 15, 1918. 
turned several days later 
expecting to find a larger set, but no more were added. This little mother 
bird was very attentive to her nest and its two treasures. When first disturbed 
she would dash to the left into some clumps of sedge and spirea bushes, then 
across the outlet where she would remain for a short time and then come hop- 
ping back from pad to pad. She would then approach under cover as near as 
possible to the clump sheltering the nest, make a short run, hop up over the 
fallen blades, and settle down on her nest (fig. 31). After being disturbed a 
number of times she would dash away as at first into the sedge but would re- 
turn almost immediately and resume her task of incubating, seemingly uncon- 
cerned with the many dangers that seemed to beset her on all sides. A pair of 
