July, 19o6 I LAND BIRDS OF SAN ONOi?'RE, CALIFORNIA 95 had to leave the nest unexplored altho the female was sitting and we were sure that there was a set of eggs there. We again visited this nest on March 28, ?9o6, and we were prepared this time. Pinger fired his gun and the male flushed when we were about fifty yards below the nest. Both hawks were rather quiet and did not swoop down at us much, but wreaked vengeance on some ravens and innocent turkey vultures that came too near the cliff. The nest cavity was forty-two feet below the bush to which the rope was tied. This cavity Was about as large as a wash tub and faced toward the south. The three eggs were covered with mud, and it was evident that they had been quite wet. There was absolutely no attempt at nest building, the eggs being deposited on the damp sand. The embryos in the three eggs had begun to feather out so the eggs must have been laid about the middle of March. The eggs have an unusually light ground color and measure ?.99x?-53, 2.o3x?.52 and 2.o3xL58. There were large numbers of valley quail and mourn- ing doves in that immediate vicinity and we saw bunches of quail feathers near the duck hawk's nest. On March 25, ?9o6, as we were strolling up the beach we heard a Pasadena thrasher si?ging, and looking around we discovered him perched on a small bush that grew right at the base of the cliff. It was rain, ing at the time and we ap- proached quite near the bird before he suspended his merry song and slipped off to disappear among some bushes close by. I was quite surprised to find this bird on the beach as I had considered it an inland bird and have never seen it so near the ocean before. During our stay in ?9o5 we became interested in a flock of valley quail that came to roost every night in a small elder tree that grew within thirty feet of our camp. Each evening I recorded the time that the quail came to roost and foumt that during a period covering eight days, their time of going to roost did not vary more than ten minutes either way, from 6:? 5 o'clock. On rainy or cloudy days they were seven or eight minutes early and on bright clear afternoons they were a little late but they were so regular in their habits that when they came to roost I knew it was 6:? 5 o'clock without looking at my watch. In May ?9o4 we found 'Pexas nighthawks abundant about the marsh in the early evening. They began to appear shortly after sundown and by the time darkness fell there were at least 30o birds diving down at each other or skimming swiftly over the water catching insects. Altho these birds were so abundant in the evening we never succeeded in flushing any during the daytime so I supposed that they must have come from some distance to this feeding ground. The abundance of insect life about the marsh furnished the food supply for a large number of swallows. In March of both ?9o5 and ?9o6 we identified the barn, rough-winged, violet-green, cliff and white-bellied tree swallows, as well as the western martin. The rough-winged and barn swallows were not numerous and were evidently just transients on their way north during the spring migration. The other species were very numerous. The cliff swallows were building on the section house on March 30, ?9o6. A set of four fresh eggs of the white-bellied tree swallow was found in a woodpecker's hole in an elder bush on May 3o, ?9o4 . A set of four fresh eggs of the western martin was found in a natural cavity of a sycamore on May 3o, ?9o4. The nest was made of fine grass and a few bits of dry sycamore leaves. Another nest was found on March 27, ?9o5, that was near- ing co?npletion. This nest was about twelve feet up in a hole in a sycamore. This year, the last of March, we found six pairs of martins that were selecting nesting
