ORNITHOLOGIST 
AND 
OOLOGIST. 
$1.00 per 
aiiDiim. 
Eatablished March 187.’), 
Joseph M. Wade, editor ami publisher. 
10 cents 
single copy. 
VOL. VI. 
ROCKVILLE, CONN., MAY, i88i. 
NO. 3 
Henslow’s Sparrow. 
NESTING IN NORTHERN CONN. 
Henslow’s Sparrow, Coturniculus hens- 
lowi, has apparently been on the increase 
in this town (Eastford) during the last 
live or six years. I think it was in 1876 
that I first detected it by its note, in a 
swampy meadow. Whenever I passed the 
place during the season the same monoto¬ 
nous soimd could be heard, and the bird 
has made his home there every year since. 
Two years later I heard one in another 
small meadow, not far from the first. On 
the 6th of August 1879, I had the pleasure 
of examining two nests of this species in a 
single field, which a farmer had uncovered 
the day before, while mowing. The land 
was very high, but wet or springy, though 
having nothing like the appearance of the 
swampy places where these birds usually 
make their home. Each nest contained 
three eggs. One set of eggs which I took 
was so far advanced in incubation that I 
found it impossible to blow them. I left 
one nest intending to return the next 
morning with a gim for the purpose of se¬ 
curing the female, but during the night 
some animal destroyed both nest and eggs. 
The nests were very slight structures, com¬ 
posed of dry grass and lined, if lined at all, 
with the same material, no finer than the 
bulk of the nest. One of them was on the 
side of a “cradle knoll” the ground all 
around it being quite wet. The nest was 
on level ground in a dry spot and the rim 
was sunk to a level with the surface. The 
bird was on the nest and at my approach 
she slipped off and ran away through the 
short grass very much like a mouse. The 
eggs of this species cannot be positively 
distinguished from those of the Yellow¬ 
winged Sparrow, Coturnicuhis passerinus. 
In one nest the eggs were considerably 
elongated and quite pointed at the smaller 
end. In the other they were more nearly 
round and not sufficiently pointed to ren¬ 
der the two ends distinguishable. These 
were undoubtedly the second layings of 
the season, which accounts for there being 
so few eggs. I captured one of the birds, 
which proved to be a male, and his plu¬ 
mage, owing to the moult, was in a most 
chlapidated condition; minus about half 
the tail and other feathers in proportion. 
In the afternoon of July 17th, 1880, in 
driving from Putnam to Eastford I heard 
five of these birds in as many different 
places; two in Woodstock and three in 
Eastford. A few days afterward I inquir¬ 
ed of a farmer v ho had recently mowed a 
meadow in which I heard one of them, if 
he had found any birds nests there, and he 
replied that he did mow over a “little 
ground bird’s” nest having three eggs, 
which he described as white with brown 
spots, but unfortunately the horse rake 
had obliterated all traces of it. 
One morning in May, 1879, I foimd one 
of these birds and imdertook to capture 
him, which proved to be no easy matter. 
When he first rose from the ground I was 
not ready for him and with a short flight 
he dropped into cover. I hastened to the 
spot where he disappeared, but when I got 
where he was he wasn’t there. After floun¬ 
dering around for some time in the water 
and over the “tussocks” I started him once 
more, but in a direction where I was not 
looking, and with a short flight he plunged 
I into the grass again. He had a wonder- 
