256 
FLYCATCHERS 
Distribution. — Breeds in Lower Sonoran zone from Texas to eastern 
Arizona and south through Mexico, except Yucatan and the Pacific coast 
north of Colima. 
Nest. — A wall pocket made of small pellets of mud mixed with dried 
grass, weed fibers, and hair, placed in wells and on sides of buildings and 
cliffs. Eggs: 3 to 6, white, or finely dotted with reddish brown around 
the larger end. 
Food. — Insects and wild berries. 
The sharply contrasted black and white plumage of the black 
phoebe of whichever form make him the handsomest of the common 
flycatchers. He is not averse to civilization and may be met com¬ 
monly just off the highways usually near water. I have found him 
in a San Francisco cemetery, in Sutro Heights Park, in Pasadena, 
bathing in a reservoir beside the street, and in Santa Cruz perched 
on the tip of a century plant leaf in front of a hotel. He has all the 
flycatcher mannerisms, and as he sits watching for insects jets his 
tail and quivers his wings at his sides, darts out with a liquid hip', a 
rising kee-ree', and falling kee-wray', snaps up an insect, and settles 
back again on his perch. 
At Twin Oaks, California, I found the phcebes nesting in a deserted 
well and also inside a whitewashed chicken house, and was told of 
their having built under the eaves of a kitchen, the pair getting 
their meals about the fly screens before the window. Such centers of 
civilization are not always chosen by them, however, and I have 
found them in the foothills of the Sierra and in a narrow lonely 
canyon of the mountains of southern California, where their wall- 
pocket nest was fastened against a cliff behind a hanging vine. 
458a. S. n. semiatra (Vigors). Western Black 
Phcebe. 
Similar to S. nigricans but under tail coverts pure 
white. 
Distribution. — Mainly in Lower Sonoran zone on the 
Pacific coast, from Oregon to Colima, Mexico; also most 
of Arizona. 
Food. — Largely winged insects. 
GENUS CONTOPUS. 
General Characters. — Feet extremely small; wing at least six times as 
long as tarsus; tarsus not longer than bill, but longer than 
£ middle toe with claw, or with a conspicuous white cottony 
patch on each side of rump. 
Fig. 331. 
KEY TO SPECIES. 
1. Length 7.10-8.00. 
2. With conspicuous white cottony tufts on sides of rump; under parts 
without yellow. borealis, p. 257. 
2'. Without cottony rump tufts ; belly yellowish. Arizona. 
pallidiventris, p. 25P 
