Sept., 1904 I 
THE CONDOR 
129 
tained four each. Do the pelicans keep tab on the number of fish stowed away in 
the pouch, and stop at a certain figure? 
The old birds for the most part did not come near the island while we were 
there. Now and again, however, a line of six or eight would circle about above 
us, out of gunshot, turn their heads so as to look down upon us as they passed 
over, and then return to their companions. Soon after we set out to return to the 
mainland a “committee” of six inspected the premises, flying around the island 
several times but did not alight. This manoeuver was repeated several times, 
though not by the same number of birds. Finally, when we were more than a 
half mile distant, an old bird dropped down upon the island, and soon others 
came, usually flying in lines, all the birds back of the leader flapping their wings, 
or sailing, as he did, this characteristic giving them a strange, machine-like ap- 
pearance. It was not long before all the pelicans in sight were upon, or about, 
the island, glad no doubt, to resume the even tenor of the life which had been so 
rudely disturbed by intruders. 
Provo City, Utah. 
Notes on Unusual Nesting Sites of the Pacific Yellow- throat 
BY A. W. JOHNSON 
N exceptionally heavy rainfall in the autumn of 1903 and spring of 1904 
flooded all the low-lying lands at the northern end of Clear Lake, Califor- 
^ ^ nia. The whole of the tule lands, covering hundreds of acres were still 
under water at the end of May. In normal seasons the old clumps of tules on and 
near to the lake shore, and in and around the many ponds and sloughs in the vi- 
cinity, afford favorite nesting cites to bicolored and yellow-headed blackbirds, song 
sparrows, tule wrens, and also to great numbers of that charming little bird, the 
Pacific yellow-throat (^Geothlypis trichas arizela'). 
The object of this paper is to give some little account of the admirable way in 
which the yellow-throats rose to the occasion and adapted themselves to new and 
changed conditions. Nearly all the nesting sites noted must, I think, be looked 
upon as more or less abnormal. P'rom May 14 to July 12, 1904, I examined over 
sixty ne.sts containing either eggs or young, and in addition many others in course 
of construction. A remarkable divergence in the choice of nesting sites is shown 
by dififerent pairs, both as to situation and proximity to water. 
Very few nests were built right on the ground; far more, notably those placed 
amongst tangled grass and weeds and in growing barley, were raised slightly above 
it from two to six inches as a rule, while nests built in trees and bushes ranged 
all the way from a foot to twenty-two feet eleven inches above the ground. 
Ten nests were in black oak trees, mostly in thick bunches of mistletoe grow- 
ing on the trees, and varied in height from five feet to seventeen feet six inches, 
actual measurement. Two nests were in cypress trees, one each in blue gum and 
cottonwood, six in olive trees in an orchard one hundred yards from water; many 
were in willows, standing in shallow water and in alder bushes bordering sloughs; 
others were in patches of wild rose bushes close to a lake, slough or stream. One 
nest was found in a cultivated rose bush trained against the side of a house, an- 
other affixed to stalks of alfalfa, while a third was built in the middle of a dwarf sun- 
