94 
THE CONDOR 
| Vol. VIII 
mon. It seemed as tho a general exodus had taken place. This year we 
found four pairs of horned owls, all of which were nesting in red-tails’ nests. On 
March 29 a set of two sterile eggs were taken from a red-tail’s nest sixty feet up 
in a sycamore. The bird flushed when we were about 150 yards from the nest. 
This timidity was probably a personal characteristic of that individual as they 
are usually hard to flush. A partially devoured wood rat was found on the edge 
of this nest. On March 30 two other nests were found both containing downy 
young about a week old. As I was climbing up to one of these nests the old bird 
flopped off just as I reached the base of the nest while her faithful spouse sat 
snoozing away, hunched up on a limb that extended out beyond the nest. A 
fourth bird was flushed but we did not investigate the contents of the nest. 
Among other things found in horned owls’ nests were the remains of meadow 
mice, gophers and a brown-footed wood-rat. 
Several barn owls’ nests were located in hollow sycamores and crannies in 
the cliffs. One nest which on March 25, 1905, contained four eggs and one newly 
hatched young held three half-grown young on March 25, 1906. California 
screech owls were not at all plentiful and no nests were located. 
A pair of burrowing owls were seen on March 30. One was sitting at the en- 
trance of a deserted ground squirrel burrow while the other perched on a newly 
installed telephone pole which was evidently a welcome improvement in their 
domain as it afforded the only elevated perch in the neighborhood. 
American sparrow hawks were common in the sycamores where they 
nested in natural cavities and in old flicker holes. A set of five fresh eggs was 
found March 27, 1903, and a nest with four full-fledged young was located on 
May 29, 1904. 
Red-bellied hawks made themselves conspicuous by squalling as they flew 
about over the northern oak-covered slopes. The crows and red-bellied hawks 
usually nested in the same locality and it was hard to distinguish the hawks’ nests 
from the crows’ nests as the birds were shy and often flushed before we located 
the nests. On April 1, 1905, we found a nest with the old bird sitting. The nest 
was placed up against a trunk of a large sycamore that towered up above a dense 
grove of live oaks. The nest had evidently been used for several years previously 
and had just been relined with sycamore bark and green leaves. The nest con- 
tained three handsome eggs in which incubation had just started. The ground 
color of all the eggs was clear white. Two of the eggs have a series of heavy 
bay blotches about the larger end. One of these eggs was especially well marked 
being the handsomest egg out of twenty-three sets and sixty-five eggs. The third 
egg had only a few pale heliotrope purple shell markings. 
On March 30, 1906, I found another nest that I had missed the previous year. 
This nest was up against the main branch of a tree that ran out over a creek. The 
bird flushed when I rapped on the tree trunk. The nest was lined with fine syca- 
more bark and contained three eggs of the regulation type. The six eggs meas- 
ured 2.06x1.57, 2.13x1.63, 2.07x1.60 and 2.18x1.67, 2.16x1.67, 2.18x1.70. A male 
red-bellied hawk shot April r, 1905, had one Jerusalem cricket and two fence 
lizards in its stomach. 
About five miles back from the coast there was a large crescent-shaped sand- 
stone cliff that had numerous potholes in its face which from a distance gave it the 
appearance of having had the small pox. It appeared as tho the whole side of 
the hill had slumped off into the canyon leaving a cliff about 150 feet high. On 
April 1, 1905, we discovered that a pair of duck hawks were nesting in one of the 
pot-holes. But the cliff bulged out just above the nest and as we had no rope we 
