106 
THE CONDOR 
Vol. XTV 
performance aliout fifteen times before going ofif to perch and preen himself on a 
Xicotiana. 
1 :42 — h^our White-throated Swifts just Hew dizzily past high overhead, twit- 
tering violently as is their wont. Two clashed and fell, fluttering for what looked 
like several hundred feet. Another attached itself to the nucleus and all fell till 
I thought they would descend clear to the ground. But they separated in time to 
each dart off on his separate way. A male Costa Hummer is very diligent at the 
Pentstemons. In three cases he sipped at every one of the open flowers on each 
spike — 6, 6, and 12 — then sipped at one blossom of another spike and flew off. 
Several pairs of Lawrence Goldfinches are about with their wheezy notes. Also 
a pair of Willow Goldfinches (male not perfectly yellow, though fairly bright, but 
in full song), and lots of Green-backed Goldfinches. 
1 :56 — I have moved across the waste lot about one hundred yards, and am 
seated on a stone-pile by the creek, with a walnut {Juglans calif ornica) fifty feet 
away, several clumps of Xicotiana and some poison-oak thickets nearby. A Pasa- 
dena Thrasher is watching me from a Xicotiana 150 feet upstream. It has been 
bathing and is preening and shaking itself violently. There are several pairs 
of Willow Goldfinches drying themselves in the walnut and bushes nearby. Gold- 
finches seem more than most other birds to enjoy bathing: this in spite of its 
being a sunless day, dense high fog with even an occasional drizzle. A Black- 
headed Grosbeak has been singing from the walnut almost continuously since one 
o'clock. They are by far the most voluble singers of all the birds within hearing. 
Perhaps the Green-backed Goldfinches come in next. I have seen and heard both 
the Bullock and Arizona Hooded Orioles in the vicinity. This location is too near 
the noisy brook for bearing birds, so I will move back to the other edge of the 
waste lot. 
2:10 — Just got an eight-foot view of a female Costa Hummer, at Xicotiana 
flowers. A flock, of separate pairs, mostly, of all three species of goldfinch are 
feeding in a rank patch of Amsinckia, evidently shelling out green seed pods at 
the bases of the flower spikes. There are at least two Long-tailed Chats singing, 
but I have only gotten a fleeting glimpse of one as it flushed from a brush pile. 
Just saw a Golden-crowned Sparrow. 
2 :25 — I just got a good view ( twenty feet) of a Lincoln Sparrow in a pile of 
dry orange trimmings. I saw probably the same bird a few minutes ago in the 
green weeds under the walnut by the stream. A Least \dreo has been in the oak 
or around the brush patch all the afternoon. It only sings occasionally, uttering 
its brief song three to five times, at intervals of five seconds or .so. The “theme" 
is uttered with rising inflection, as if asking a Cjuestion : then, with a falling inflec- 
tion, as if replying. These two kinds of notes are uttered alternately. Each 
“theme” is a warbling jumble of vireo notes uttered ha.stily, with no care in 
])ronunciation. The rising and falling inflections in alternate themes is the best 
character of the .song. One of the Chats is singing now in plain view on a Xico- 
tiana one hundred feet away. Song intervals : w 5 ch 4-w 6-3 ch 4 w 7 ch 3 w 5 
ch 5 ch — -it’s hard to time the chat’s .song: the whistle (w) most always alternates 
with some sort of a chuck ( ch). I should judge the intervals between the individual 
notes to average four seconds. He has been singing thus for fully five minutes. 
Sometimes a whistle is of four clear notes each with falling inflection and close 
together, very similar to a boy calling his dog : others are single clear whistles, 
loud and of carrying (juality : then the chucks are, some, like a Parkman Wren 
