Birds of Dead River Eegion^a. F.H.C. 



10. Parus hudsonicus, (Hudsonian Chickadee). 

 A small flock seen in January, 1884, from which 

 I secured three. They came about the lumber 

 camps, to the shelter of the hay shed, during a 

 snow storm. 



0,&0. XI. Aug. 1886. p. 115 



Breeding of the Hudsonian Chickadee (Pa, us Audsonicu,) at Dover 

 Me.- There has been so little said or written in relation to the breeding 

 of this species that the record of a nest with young discovered by the 

 writer the present season may be of some value to the working ornithol- 

 ogists. 



During a I2 years' residence at Dover, Piscataquis Countj, I have occa- 

 sional) j during my rambles met this species, but the meetings have 

 usually occurred during the late fall or winter seasons, and have been so 

 infrequent as to merit a special record in my notes. Accordingly it was 

 indeed a surpri.se to discover a pair engaged in the act of rearing a brood 

 of young this season. The date was June 2i. I had spent the morning 

 botanizing in a place locally known as Sangerville bog, located due west 

 from Dover village, the nearest portion of the bog being about a mile 

 distant. The boundary line between the towns of Dover and Sangerville 

 passes directly through the morass, a portion lying in either town, but 

 the ' find ' was located on the Dover side. 



suspecr a orooa oi nestlings mignt be near. Jioth birds were seen and 

 positively identified through my glass at a distance of about ^o feet 

 before the nest was discovered. While I was examining the nest, the 

 bird with the moth in its bill, presumably the female, as she was the most 

 fearless of the pair, flew to within seven or eight feet of my head and 

 nearly on a level with it, showing the greatest anxiety and uttering pite- 

 ous cries. Her call notes before I approached the nest were simUar to 

 the following syllables, tsrvee-cAee ya-a^a-ck (emphasis on last syllable 



and with rising inflection) and were uttered at intervals of five or six sec 

 ends quite constantly. The male was not apparently as anxious as his 

 mate, nor did I hear any note from him during my stay in the vicinity of 

 near a half hour. 



I could not remain longer to study this interesting family, and after 

 carefully marking the spot, returned home intending to return and secure 

 material proof of the bird's identity, but business detained me and I was 

 not able to again visit the place until July i, an absence of ten days 

 when I found the nest empty. From its appearance I had no doubt that 

 the young brood had occupied it until within a day or so, and expected to 

 find them near, but a search of the surrounding territory failed to dis- 

 cover any trace of them. 



The stub containing the nest was secured and the nest-lining examined 

 which proved to consist mainly of vegetable down from ferns and what 



