202 
THE CONDOR 
Vol. XII 
On the side of the hill just west of camp I found another pair of Mountain 
Chickadees feeding young. The nest was as usual in a fir stump and the entrance 
was about eight feet up and facing south. At this nest I again made use of a large 
boulder which lay on the southeast side of the stump. The birds were very tame 
and the boulder was large enuf so that I sat on it beside the camera with no 
blind or attempt at concealment. There were several dead branches near the en- 
trance to the nest, which the birds used as perches when going to feed the young. 
I attempted to get pictures by focusing the camera on portions of these branches; 
but the Chickadees were perverse little creatures, and chose almost any perch ex- 
cept the one on which the camera was focust. 
After many attempts I finally got a saw and removed all the branches but one, 
after which I had more success. Both birds fed the young frequently and, after 
the first time or two, didn't appear to mind my presence in the least. So far as I 
could see the food was always insects, often a bill full of amber-colored gall-flies 
that were very abundant among the young firs, and occasionally a smooth, pale 
green or light gray caterpillar. On the 
evening of June 26, as we were preparing 
to move camp the next day, I decided 
to open this nest to see the young and get 
pictures of them if possible. I sawed out 
and removed a piece of thick bark from 
in front of the nest. As soon as I toucht 
one of the young, however, the whole 
brood popt out, one after the other, so 
fast that I could hardly count them, tho 
I believed the number was five. Two of 
them were well able to fly and I could not 
catch them. The other three I caught 
and put back in the nest and closed the 
opening I had made. The sun was too 
low to take pictures then and I hoped 
these young might stay so that I could 
get the pictures early the next morning. 
I was disappointed, however, for tho I 
reacht the nest early, the young had left 
and could not be found , tho the parents were in the neighborhood and calling excitedly. 
In the rear of my tent at this camp was an old aspen stump in which a pair 
of Mountain Bluebirds ( Sicilia currucoides ) were nest-bilding. They were evi- 
dently starting a second brood, for I remembered seeing Bluebirds with nesting 
material in the middle of April. A short time later I found another Bluebird’s 
nest not far from camp in a fir stump. This nest was in an old flicker hole on the 
south side of the stump. The hole had never been completed and was so shallow 
that the yellow mouths of the six young could be seen from some distance away. 
My first attempt to get photographs of these birds, based on experience with eastern 
Bluebirds, failed entirely. The birds were very suspicious and wouldn’t approach 
if I were within a hundred feet of the nest. I finally had to resort to a blind. I 
used my bed cover again and bilt the blind and set up the camera in the morning 
before breakfast, leaving it until the noon hour when the sun was right for pic- 
tures. I was fortunate in getting into the blind while both the parents were away, 
something I did not succeed in doing a second time. I found it entirely useless to 
wait for these suspicious birds if they had once seen me go into the blind. I ob- 
Fig. 70. 
MALE MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRD 
AT NEST ENTRANCE 
