FINCHES, SPARROWS, ETC.: GROSBEAK 
675 
Fe region it is very common. Two or three pairs nest on the Indian School campus. 
Nests are common in the willows along the streams and in the scrub oaks on the 
mountain sides up to 10,500 feet (Jensen, 1923).] It is most common in the summer 
at 6,000 to 8,000 feet. [The center of its abundance at the breeding season seems 
to be 6,000 to 6,500 feet (Ligon, 1916-1918). Males were seen at Lake Burford, 
7,700 feet, June 2 and 9, 191S (Wetmore)]. It was seen June 19, 1909, at 8,500 
feet on Bear Ridge in the Zuni Mountains; a few days later at 8,600 feet on Mount 
Sedgwick (Goldman); and July 20, 1903, at 8,700 feet on the Pecos (Bailey). [Its 
earliest nesting date above 6,000 feet—at 6,500 feet west of Chloride, in the Black 
Range—was May 26, 1916, with three slightly incubated eggs. Laying, however, 
is generally about June 1 (Ligon, 1916-1918). Fresh sets are found May 20- 
July 1 (Jensen).1 Young in the nest were noted, June 15, 1903, at Montoya, at 
about 7,600 feet (Bailey). It breeds down to 5,600 feet in the Animas Mountains 
(Goldman), to 4,800 at Dog Spring (Mearns), and to 3,800 feet at Mesilla (Merrill). 
It does not winter anywhere in the United States, and begins its southward 
migration late in July; even by the middle of July it is already wandering away from 
the nesting site. It was taken on August 5, 1903, at 10,000 feet below Pecos Baldy 
(Weller); August 16, 1904, at 9,500 feet on Red River (Gaut). It was noted in the 
Santa Clara Canyon, August 21-26, 1906, and near Frisco, August 31, 1908 (Bailey). 
Few individuals are left in the State after the first of September. It was seen near 
Willis, September 2, 1883 (Henshaw); at Oak Canyon, September 2, 1903 (Howell); 
and at Ruidoso, September 10, 1898 (Barber). The last noted at Cooney in 1889 
was on September 10 (Barrel!). The species is therefore one of the earliest migrants 
to leave the State, but since laggards have been noted in Colorado even to October 
it is evident that these New Mexico dates do not represent the latest that it remains 
in the State. 
On the return in the spring, it is one of the latest migrants. It was noted at 
Chloride, April 28, 1915 (Ligon); a specimen was taken May 3, 1914, at Silver City 
(Kellogg); [it was noted there May 10, 1920 (Ligon)]; it is recorded as arriving at 
Cooney May 7, 1889, and at Carlisle May 4, 1890 (Barrell); it was taken May 
6 and 8, 1904, at Rinconada (Surber); and at Willis, May 16, 1900 (Birtwell). 
But at the upper limit of the breeding range near Halls Peak, 8,000 feet, the first 
was not seen until June 12, 1895 (Barber).—W. W. Cooke. 
Nest. —Usually in chaparral, made loosely of sticks, weeds, or rootlets. Eggs: 
3 or 4, pale bluish white, thickly spotted with brown. 
Food. —“It feeds upon cherries, apricots, and other fruits and also does some 
damage to green peas and beans; but it is so active a foe to certain horticultural 
pests that we can afford to overlook its faults. Several kinds of scale insects are 
freely eaten, and one, the black olive scale, constitutes a fifth of the total food. 
In May, many cankerworms and codling moths are consumed, and almost a sixth 
of the bird’s seasonal food consists of flower beetles, which do incalculable damage 
to cultivated flowers and to ripe fruit. For each quart of fruit consumed it destroys 
in actual bulk more than lj^ quarts of black olive scales and 1 quart of flower 
beetles besides a generous quantity of codling-moth pupae and cankerworms. It 
is obvious that this pays many times over for the fruit destroyed” (Henshaw, 
1914, p. 680). Alfalfa weevils are also eaten (Kalmbach). It is another enemy 
of the potato beetle and the hairy caterpillars, and 58.75 per cent of its food consists 
of harmful insects (McAtee). 
General Habits. —The Black-headed, brown-breasted Grosbeak 
is characteristically a bird of the Upper Sonoran oak, juniper, and nut 
pine region, and of the thick cottonwood groves and deciduous trees 
