March, ?9o 5 [ BIRD NOTES FROM THE CENTRAL SIERRAS 43 Of all Sierra birds none seemed to possess a greater breadth and depth of char- acter and none impressed its individuality more deeply upon us travelers than the stout-hearted little mountain chickadee (Parus gainbell). From Big Trees on to end of the trip he was ever with us and, while always tending strictly to his own affairs and resenting any intrusion on his own, he was yet far from unsociable and his dear high-pitched notes helped to interpret the spirit of the forest and the mountain. In every way he seemed to justify his position of high development among birds to which he has been assigned. His independence of thought (or is it only instinct?) and action were well shown in his defense of his home. The sitting bird would either slip quietly from its nest when danger was still afar off or would resolutely refuse to budge at all. The sound emitted by a sitting moun- tain chickadee when disturbed was, in my experience, rather that of a sudden ex- pulsion of air from the lungs than that of the hiss of a snake, as Mr. Barlow de- scribes it. a The explosive sound was accompanied by a very decided beat of both wings against the sides and bottom of the nest cavity. Seven nests were noted in all, four of them being in the usual nesting sites between three and eighteen feet above the ground, as given in Mrs. Bailey's Handbook. The other three pairs re- fused to be bound by the ordinary rules for conventional chickadees and placed their homes at less ambitious elevations. One pair chose a small and well protected natural cavity in a living juniper and built the nest at a height of twelve inches from the ground, the entrance being eight inches higher and quite small. This nest contained on June ?9 seven unspotted eggs nearly ready to hatch. Another pair made use of a small burnt tamarack stump which contained a natural cavity, the rather small opening of which was just twelve inches above the ground. This cavity was straight and vertical and slightly over twelve inches in depth, so that the nest was on an exact level with the surface of the ground. This nest contained five fresh spotted eggs on June I7 on which the parent was sitting. The third pair of birds worthy of particular mention had their home in a natural cavity of a big pine stump near Blood's corral. The entrance was an inch wide, one and a half inches high, quite regular in shape and exactly one inch above the ground. The cavity sloped slightly downward for ten inches to the nest, which was thus eight inches at least beneath the surface of the soil. The nest was observed several times on June 2t, the parent sometimes leaving the nest hole when I was still some dis- tance off and again refusing to leave on any provocation. Seven unspotted eggs constituted the complement and from appearances I judged them to be advanced in incubation. In case of most of these nests it was of course necessary to enlarge the entrance somewhat in order to arrive at the desired information. So far as I observed this did not in any ca?e cause the birds to forsake their nests. Of water birds only five species were noted on the entire trip, viz., Forster tern, black tern, spotted sandpiper, killdeer, and an unidentified duck. My notes on these are hardly satisfactory enough to justify any lengthening of the present article. An early summer trip to the Sierras is both a thing to be enjoyed in the mak- ing and a memory of incomparable worth. All the better if one may allow the birds to add to the joys inspired by grand scenery and mountain air. One may well repeat Belding's and Barlow's advice to visit these mountains for oneself or Muir's enthusiastic cry: "Come to the mountains and see!" MI. Vernon, Iowa. TIlE CONDOR, III, p. 11,3.
