THE] CONDO. Bulletin of the Cooper Ornithological Club, A BI-1V[ONTHLY EXPONENT OF CALIFORNIAN ORNITHOLOGY. Vol. 3. No. 5. Santa Clara, Cal., September-October, 1901. a.oo a Year Some Characteristics of the Mountain Chickadee, BY C, BARLOW, SANTA CLARA? CAL. T was a cheery chick-a-dee-dee that gave me my first introduction .to this vivacious bird in the Sierra, and when I later discovered a nest hidden securely in an old pine stub deep in the forest, I could not resist the impres- sion that here indeed was contentment personified. Here, far from the habitd- tions of nmn, and beside an abandoned trail which had long since ceased to re- echo human footsteps had settled a pair of Mountain Chickadees (]Varus ?am- beli). No matter how fared their neigh- bors and with no time to gossip with. the shy warblers of their domain, t,]a4?e little birds seemed unconscious else save their piney mansion. '.? True they were not fastidious and had taken up house-keeping in old quarters, and their particular stub with its deep-creased bark and rotten.found- ation did not differ from a thousand other stubs which dotted the forest. But this stump, capped by the previous winter's snow, was destined to become the arena of intense activity with the advent of Spring. It has seemed to me that many of the characters of every-day lice have their counterparts in the bird world. Some of the feathered tribe show great delib- eration in their work, as though spring would never wane; others, such as the Wood Pewee and flycatchers find much time to watch the doings of their neigh- bors, but the chickadee is the ideal of industry. I have never seen a Moun- tain Chickadee that he was not deeply engrossed in his work, his cMck-a-dee- dee chick-a-dee-dee sounding shrilly the warning that no one must delay him. This black-and-white Parus occurs from the lower ridges of the Sierra up to the summit, and deserted indeed are the woods that do not re-echo his call. Like most of the resident species using ? protected nests, the Mountain Chicka- dee begins nest-building early, being but little influenced by the elements. Rotten stubs have the preference as nesting sites, particularly where the core of the tree has rotted away, leav- ing a cavity. I doubt if the birds at- tentpt much excavating, aside from car- rying out loose material. Of all the nests I have examined a majority were in pine or spruce stubs with the en- trance at the top. My first nest was found on June it, ?898, as Mr. L. E. Taylor and I were walking along the stage road. I sho? a bird'which was moving about in the timber and found it to be a Mountain Chickadee. Fearful of results I looked about for a possible nest. An old spruce stub about three feet high and nine inches through stood near the ?oad and a two-inch hole in its top led down into the darkness. On scraping
