THE. CO.IB.R olume XX .Jul:t-August, 1916 Number 4 NOTES ON THE NESTING OF THE I?EDPOLL By LEE R. DICE WITH TWO PHOTOS OTES on three nests of the Redpoll (Acanthis linaria linaria)found in the interior of Alaska are here presented as an addition to our knowledge of
the breeding habits of this species. These notes were secured hy the au-
thor while a Deputy Fur Warden in the Alaska Fisheries Service, and they are published with the permission of the United States Bureau of Fisheries. During the winter, Redpolls are found in 'flocks consisting of a few individ- uals up to several hundred, but in the spring the flocks break up and the birds pair off. On the No.rth Fork. of the Kuskokwim I?iver, near its head, pairing began in 1912 during the last week in April, but a flock of fifty was seen as late as May 7. The exact position of this locality is about seventy-five miles almost directly south of Tanana, Alaska, and about eighty miles north and a little west of Mount McKinley. In this region the valleys and low hills are largely covered by an open scrubby forest of black spruce, beneat h which the ground is heavily carpeted with sphagnum moss. Lakes and small streams are numerous. Along the streams and exte_nding up on southern hillsides are patches of paper birch and white spruce forest, while on the river bars thickets of willow and alder are common. The first nest was found May 20, and was apparently completed. The nest was placed about four feet above ground in a willow which was growing at the edge of the river in a fringe of willows and alders. The following day, May 21, two more nests were found, both incomplete. One of these (no. 2) was _about three feet from the ground in a small paper birch which was in a. partly open place where the paper birch and white spruce forest had been burned off a number of years before. It was about twenty feet from the river, just behind a screen of willows. The other nest (no. 3) was about five feet high in a willow,
