3-: THE BAY STATE OOLOGIST. 



A Day's Collecting. 



BY H. C. COOK. POTSDAM, N. Y. 



On the 23d of May, last season, my chum and myself started out for a good solid 

 day's work in the field. We took our climbing irons, egg-boxes and a big lunch, 

 for it has been our experience that it makes a fellow awful hungry to walk eight or 

 ten miles and shin up as many trees before dinner. 



About a mile from the village we came to a small grove of high timber. Just 

 before we reached it, a crow flew out to meet us, circled over our heads and re- 

 turned again, a sure sign of a nest. We had, however, considerable difficulty in 

 finding it, as it was remarkably well concealed for so large a nest, in a beech about 

 thirty-five feet from the ground. It contained five highly incubated eggs of near- 

 ly uniform size, but differing considerably in the ground color and markings. The 

 average measurement was 1.60x1.12. Three of the eggs were dark green, marked 

 with darker blotches, and the other two a much lighter green in ground color 

 with the same colored blotches. 



After leaving this grove, we passed through several orchards without finding 

 anything until we came to the last one, where my chum spied a nest in a low apple 

 tree. Approaching it carefully, we obtained a good view of the bird, which I at 

 once knew to be a Black-billed Cuckoo (Coccygus erythrophthalmus.) The nest 

 contained three dull green eggs, very peculiar in regard to size, as one was small, 

 the next larger and the last measured nearly twice the size of the first. One was 

 fresh and the other two in different stages of incubation. 



We stopped here to blow our eggs and eat our dinner, as it was about noon. 

 After we had accomplished this last most important duty, we continued our search 

 looking here and there, but seeing no desirable nest, until it began to get rather 

 discouraging, when, while hunting for the nests of the White-rumped Shrike 

 CLanius ludovicianus excubitorides) in a large field of thorn apple trees, skirted 

 by a swampy woods, I made the great find of the day. I was passing by an old 

 dead stump, when, from between the roots and almost under my feet, a brownish 

 colored bird started up aud flew away, making a peculiar whistling noise as it 

 went. Looking down, I saw a fine set of four eggs of the American Woodcock 

 (Philohela minor.) They were of unusual size, the largest measuring 1.85x1.10 in. 



This ended our day's collecting, and we went home well satisfied with the fruits 

 of our labor. 



