Sept. x9o7 RUleOUS-CROWIqED SPARROW IN SAN DIEGO All I could do was to recross the gulch and wait. Another half-hour of blaz- ing heat and my sparrows came over the hill and alighted in the same bush as they had done on their former visit. I waited to make sure that these were my birds and while doing so saw their first perfornmnce entirely repeated. This time, how- ever, I had better success for I secured the female just after she left the nest, proving the species to be the Rufous-crowned Sparrow (Abnop]zila ru?fceps).
Dissection showed the set to be complete.
The eggs, upon blowing, proved to be slightly incubated and also had a very distinct bluish color, spoken of by the late Chester Barlow (CONDOR, Vol. IV, page 109). In fact they were nearly as blue as Arkansas Goldfinch eggs but have since faded co?miderably even tho kept in the dark. They measure as folloxvs: .74x.61, .74x62, .71x62 inches. The nest was placed at the foot of a bank which was about a foot high. A small bush which had grown on top of the ledge had died and fallen over making NEST AND EGGS OF RUFOUS-CRO?3;NED SPARROV a miniature brush pile. Into this the birds had broken their way using the fine twigs of the bush as a foundation for the nest. This mat of twigs was nearly two inches wide on the front side of tl]e nest and entirely lacking where the nest touched the bank. The nest itself was made of very fine dry yellow grass with considerable black horse hair in the lining. The iuside dimensions of the nest are one and a half inches deep by two and three-quarter inches across. The mat of twigs around the exposed edges was so interwoven with the surrounding bush that it was hard to tell exactly where the nest began. Last year a friend collected a set of four eggs of this species near San Diego, on May 13, in which incubation was complete in three, {he fourth being addled. The nest was on the ground and made entirely of grass. The eggs were slightly larger than the set just described and a very nmch paler blue. tffscondido, California.
