MASS. (Middlesex Co.) [Middlesex County, Massachusetts]
Scops Asio, nest two eggs - fresh - Belmt [Belmont]
1876. Heavy flight of snipe - Arrivals of birds during
my absense [absence] in N.B. [New Brunswick]
Saturday
April 22 [April 22, 1876] Clear and warm. Spent the day mounting my
goose and skinning ducks. Late in P.M.
took a drive with Stone [William Stone] and when coming 
through School St. a little after sunset my
eye happened to light on a Scops that was
sitting on a horozontal [horizontal] limb directly over
the road. He was very tame and after
watching him a moment I got out and
commenced pelting stones at him. Every
time the stone passed him he would dive
down nearly to the ground and sweeping
up gracefully, alight on the next tree, dropping
upon the limb and shuttering his wings suddenly
like a Buteo. Finally he took refuge in
a hollow trunk peeping out at me so
grotesquely that I could scarcely refrain
from laughing, but when I commenced 
to climb up, he was off again. Mr. A. Frazar [Abbott Frazar]
afterwards informed me that he visited
the nest of this bird in the same orchard
[delete]yes[/delete] today and found the female sitting on
two eggs & this was undoubtedly the male
parent. Juncos are still abundant & a few
fox sparrows remain. Turdus pallasi [Turdus pallasii] arrived
Apr. [April 1876] D. pinus [Dendroica pinus] Apr. [April 1876] D.Coronata [Dendroica coronata] Apr. [April 1876] D.
palmarum [Dendroica palmarum] Apr. [April 1876] Regulus calendula Apr. [April 1876]
Har. rufus [Harporhyncus rufus] Apr. [April 1876] Rallus Virgin. [Rallus virginianus] Apr. [April 1876]
Porzana Carolina Apr. [April 1876] Ceryle alcyon Apr. 16 [April 16, 1876]
Spizella pusilla Apr. [April 1876] S. socialis [Spizella socialis] Apr. [April 1876]
Arborescent vegetation is remarkably far
advanced. The chestnut leaves are well
unfolded and the lilac leaves quite large.
Frazer [Abbott Frazar] visited the Buteo lineatus nest in Deadham [Dedham]
on the 20th [April 20, 1876] and found the [female] sitting on
three eggs. He had to throw stones at her to get
her to fly & fired twice, missing both times.
[margin]John & Robert Nesbitt with John Taylor killed 11 snipe on the Fresh pond meadows today. Most of them were found in the lower swamp.[/margin]
 


