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Nov., t9oo [ THE CONDOR I2 3 tip outside of a radius of ten or twelve feet from me was loaded with all the birds it could hold up, every extra bird that settled down bending the tips over so that the rest slid off. From the out- side of the patch not a nest could be seen, but upon wedging my way in where the rules were shortest an amaz- ing sight presented itself. Nest after nest appeared, becoming more and more numerous away from the outer edge, some only a few inches above the wa- ter, some three or four feet, 'and placed so thickly that it was impossible to force one's way among them without disturbing or even upsetting more or less. There were often three or four placed directly one above another, and fre- quently some of the lower ones had been smothered out and abandoned. Where the rules were highest and thickest it was impossible to walk through them and the only means of progression was that of walking upon them and crushing them down 'for a support. In this very thick part most of the lower nests had been deserted. It seemed at first sight as if these lower tiers must have been last year's nests, but their fresh appearance contradicted this supposition and led me to conclude that either the rapid growth of the rules or the building of so many nests above them had made them too dark and inaccessible. It would have taken a bird some time to work its way down to the bottom ones, which would have been a serious matter with a lot of hun- gry mouths to feed at short intervals. Most of the occupied nests contained young, all apparently about the same age, that is from twenty-four to forty- eight hours old. A few, however, con- tained eggs, mostly in the last stages of incubation. Many of.those which had been deserted had in them from one to four decayed or partially dried, and fre- quently broken, eggs. Yet the greater part of the abandoned nests were emp- ty. Those in the more exposed situa- tions seemed to have been robbed, prob- ably by the Buteo swainsoni, which were numerous in the neighborhood and one pair of which had a nest in a tall pop- lar tree but a few yards away, and possi- bly by some of the many Nycticorax n. nwvius which simply swarmed in the most attractive spots. The nests were composed entirely, of dried grasses, lined with finer parts of same and were more or less lightly woven around the stems of the support- ing rules. Many were tilted so much to one side aS to scarcely hold the young, small as these were. How the birds could possibly remain in them when a little larger seemed a hard prob- lem to solve. The tules were white with the droppings of the birds, and many of the abandoned nests contain- ing eggs had apparently been deserted on account of being too much exposed to this whitening process. That many of the empty ones had been robbed there is hardly room to doubt. Some young ones were found lying on the ground around the pond, as far away even as seventy-five yards from the tule patch. Also several of the Buleo swainsoni shot at this time had a crop- ful of young birds, though I could not actually identify them as belonging to this species on account of the advanced state of 'digestion. The crop of one Buteo swainsoni con- tained two young just hatched and also the remains of two others with portions of the shell still sticking to them and which must have been just on the point of hatching. These were apparently the young of .4. trico/or. But one nest containing fresh eggs was found, and only one other that could be saved, though I did not overhaul the whole rookery, partly because it was impossi- ble to do so without destroying many nests by trampling or upsetting them, and partly because the mode of pro- gression was exceedingly damaging to one's bare legs and feet, as the edges of the rules cut one's skin in numerous places. In the line of flight to and from this