Concord, Mass.
1902.
May 20
  Clear with light N.E. wind. We had a heavy
rain yesterday, the first for several weeks.
  I heard a Yellow-billed Cuckoo and a Night hawk
this morning, both for the first time this year. The
Night-hawk was peeping, apparently in one of the elms
near the house, although I did not see the bird.
Arrivals
  I discovered the Hummingbird's nest this forenoon.
It is within ten feet of where the nest was last year
and on the same side of the same big elm but on a
different branch. The female was at work on it.
She kept darting to & fro between it and one of the large
branches of the elm from which she was gathering what
I took to be bits of lichen although I could see nothing
in her bill. Alighting in the nest she would turn around
and around at the same time applying the tip of her
bill to the exterior many times in succession. Then
she would fly to one of the large branches & poise
in front of it moving from place to place & just
touching the bark with her bill. I did not see the
male to-day.
Hummer's nest at farm in same tree where pair nested last year.
Lancaster, Mass.
  I used to think that Downy Woodpeckers seldom
drummed at any season other than that of early spring
but I have heard them repeatedly at Concord during the
past ten days and this evening two birds were drumming
at short intervals, one answering the other, in large sugar
maples about 100 yards apart on the river interval here.
They kept it up for nearly half-an-hour.
Downy W. drumming in May
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