Mar., 1915 
A FORTY ACRE BIRD CENSUS AT SACATON, ARIZONA 
89 
see how long incubating would take, but at about the time the young ivere due 
one egg disappeared, while the other had a hole in it and proved infertile. This 
pair of birds has frequented the yard for two years, and has become quite 
friendly, coming to a bird table for food and eating the watermelon I put out 
in the shade. They brought the three young ones to the house and gave them 
watermelon until they learned to feed themselves. 
Phainopepla nitens. Phainopepla. A pair had a nest in a mesquite near 
the west line of the tract, where they raised two young. They nest most fre- 
quently in the old growth of mesquites that have much mistletoe growing in 
them. 
Lanius ludovicianus excubitorides. White-rumped Shrike. A pair raised 
five young in a squaw-bush along one of the fences. In a mesquite tree not far 
away I found the hind legs of a young rabbit hung over a thorny branch, but 
the Shrikes may not have been responsible for this ! 
Mimus polyglottos leucopterus. Western Mockingbird. A pair raised a 
brood in the mesquite thicket but I did not find the nest till the vonng birds 
had flown. The old ones brought them up around the house for refreshments 
later, and then probably went to work on a second set, as I found a nest with 
two eggs July 7 not far from the first one. As it happened, however, this was 
about fifty yards outside the lines so cannot be counted. 
Toxostoma bendirei. Bendire Thrasher. Eight nests were found with 
three eggs each. Seven were in mesquites and one in a Lycium, the average 
height from the ground being eight feet. One pair built a nest in a mesquite 
at the bottom of the date grove and hatched three young, these leaving the 
nest about the first of May. The 15th of May the female began fighting the 
Kingbird for the nesting site as I have already related. After the Kingbirds 
drove her away she went to her old nest in the mesquite and raised three more 
young in it, the young leaving the nest July 6. At this date of writing she 
has another nest in the same tree a few feet from the twice used one, and is 
incubating three more eggs. She is surely some “mother in Israel’’. As the 
other five nests were not close together, possibly none of them were “repeat- 
ers’’. There is one exception that may have been a second set as it was found 
so late, July 11, though not near any other found before. 
The Bendire Thrasher is one bird that from all indications takes kindly to 
settlement. These birds nest near houses, on which they perch to sing, come 
into the yards, and seem fearless if not molested. If their natural shelter is 
cleared up they take kindly to artificial or planted growth and I believe will 
persist in the face of civilization. All this, of course, provided that they receive 
some measure of protection and encouragement. 
Toxostoma crissale. Crissal Thrasher. Only three nests found, and one of 
those probably a second set. All were in mesquites at an average height of 
four feet. This Thrasher is a bird of the underbrush and thickets, and appar- 
ently does not take kindly to clearing and farming operations. 
Heleodytes brunneicapillus couesi. Cactus Wren. February 15 was the 
date when the first nest, with four eggs, was found. This was in a brush shed 
alongside of the school house, used as an outside class room. The rafters were 
double, about four inches apart, and I had inserted short boards making a 
horizontal space about ten inches deep and six feet from the ground. Four 
roosting nests had been built last fall by the pair of wrens, and February 15 a 
new nest contained eggs. About the last of April the same pair built a nest on 
