48 
THE COXDOR 
Vol. XVI 
eggs, barely commenced in incubation, was taken. In two instances a period of 
four days elapsed between the laying of the first and the second egg, incubation 
starting with the deposit of the first egg. In five instances three eggs, and in 
every other case two, were a complete set. This pair of birds would invariably 
deposit a second set, and even a third, within twenty-one days from the time the 
first set was disturbed. During the wet seasons of 1907, 1908 and 1909 three eggs 
were laid, possibly indicating that the birds were finding food more plentiful than 
formerly. 
For the past several years I have been observing these birds, hoping that 
some time they would select a site where closer observation of their nesting 
habits would be possible. For the season of 1912 they chose a site which was on 
a clifif-face overlooking a deep and narrow canyon. From the opposite wall of 
this canyon the sitting bird could be observed, but was too far away for photo- 
graphic purposes. , In this nest two lusty youngsters were reared. For some 
Fig. 17. View from Nesting Site of P.acific Horned Owl near Escondido, 
California 
reason, best known to themselves, the birds left this site at the beginning of the 
present season, and set up housekeeping about three hundred feet below, in the 
same canyon, in the most accessible place they had yet used. Here, on the 2nd 
of February, we located the nest by flushing the bird, after two hours of hither- 
to fruitless search for her. 
She had selected a ledge in a large rock pile overlooking the canyon and 
valley below. The two eggs the nest contained appeared to be fresh. This nest 
was visited at intervals of once a week for the next four weeks, and in every in- 
stance one bird flushed from the nest just as I was climbing up over the big rock 
adjacent, its mate leaving its perch in a small oak tree farther down the hillside 
when I was yet some distance away. The bird leaving the nest would alight on 
some nearby rock, and ruffling up its feathers, let out a cat-call or two, but 
seemed little disturbed by my intrusion, and would immediately resume incuba- 
