426 
BIRDS OF NEW MEXICO 
usually early, but one was taken in Grant County, April 15, 1886 (Anthony); and 
others were taken April 16. In 1886, the first did not come to Apache until April 14 
(Anthony). In 1890 the first arrived at Carlisle April 16 (Barrell).—W. W. Cooke. 
Nest. —Rarely above 20 feet from the ground, in knot holes of various trees, 
cavities of old stumps, woodpecker holes, and occasionally behind loose pieces of 
bark. When a large cavity is used, the bottom is filled with weed stems, rootlets, grass, 
and bits of dry manure, on which the nest proper is built—a felted mass of hair and 
fur (in one case burro hair and duck feathers) and occasionally skins of snakes and 
small lizards. Eggs: 3 to 6, from light cream to pinkish buff, with fine longitudinal 
streaks of purple, rarely with large irregular blotches. 
Food. —Mainly wild bees and wasps, bugs, including buffalo tree hoppers, stink 
bugs, cicadas, jumping plant lice, leaf hoppers, flies, caterpillars, moths, grasshoppers, 
crickets, dragon flies, and spiders. “In its animal food the Ash-throat destroys a 
great number of harmful insects and a few beneficial ones, so that the balance is 
greatly in the bird’s favor. Its vegetable food [wild berries and seeds] has absolutely 
no economic interest” (Beal). Five taken near an apiary contained no honey bees, 
but one contained 24 robber flies, an enemy of the honey bee. 
General Habits. —The long thin body and big head and crest of 
the Ash-throated Flycatcher place it in the desert landscape when too 
far away for the recognition of its sulphur-yellow belly and rufous wing 
quills. 
Two of the birds which we saw at Lordsburg, June 2, 1907, on the 
creosote desert were flying about a disused windmill, apparently 
attracted by a swarm of winged ants. When disturbed the pair flew off 
toward the hills. 
Early in summer, Professor Merrill writes, the Ash-throated is rare in 
the valley near Mesilla Park but common in the mountains. Later, he 
says, ‘it is seen oftener in the valley, among the tornillos. In the moun¬ 
tains it is found oftenest near water, sitting quietly on a low-hanging 
limb, diligently and noiselessly taking insects” (MS). 
Near I ucson, Major Bendire found that the favorite haunts of these 
flycatchers were the denser mesquite thickets in the creek bottoms, oak 
groves along hillsides, and the shrubbery of canyons; but they were occa¬ 
sionally seen on the more open plains covered with straggling mesquite 
and patches of cactus. Two pairs were seen by the Major using aban¬ 
doned Cactus \\ rens’ nests (1895, p. 267), and others were discovered by 
Mr. Anthony nesting in the dry blossom stalks of the yucca and agave in 
New Mexico (in Bendire, 1895, p. 267). 
A peculiar nesting site was found by Mr. Ligon at the old Miller 
ranch on the Pecos—a four-inch exhaust pipe six feet long standing at an 
angle of about thirty degrees, coming from the cylinder of an abandoned 
oil engine. The pipe was smeared inside with the black fuel oil softened 
by the heat and the parent bird which flew from the nest, that was 
about twelve inches down inside the pipe, to a mesquite on a bank 
above, was so black that Mr. Ligon had difficulty in recognizing it (MS). 
At one of our camps near Santa Rosa, where the Ash-throats were 
