Page:Condor15(4).djvu/5

 July, 191,3 137 SIERRA STORMS AND BIRDS By F. S. HANFORD FTER the last of the heavy winter storms piles up great quantities of snow on the peaks and higher elevations of the Sierras, there comes a time when the sun shines for successive days and the iron grip of winter is lifted from the land. From now on bright and sunshiny weather is the rule, except for several light storms occurring in May and June, and the lnid-summer thunder showers in July or August. The spring storms after April are comparatively short in dura- tion, lasting but a day or so, but in the course of a few hours four or five inches of wet and heavy snow may fall. Alternate periods of rain and sunshine soon turn the snow to slush and it' quickly vanishes, though not witho.ut considerable damage to nesting birds, especially those species that nest on the' horizontal branches of conifers. The summer thunder storms are severe above 8,ooo feet elevation. While abundant showers of life-giving rain refresh the lower levels, hail and snow, va- ried with periods of drenching rain, combine to render life miserable to the trav- eler higher up. At Lake of the Woods; July'I2, I92, such a storm overtobk'us,' lasting, with intermissions, for seven.days. Great banks of cumulus clouds would mount into the clear sky over the southern horizon about noon, and in an hour we would be deluged with floods of rain, varied wth half. hour periods of hail, lasting sometimes far into the night. The hail stones which fell during these storms averaged from one half to one inch in diameter, and, plunging and rip- ping through the foliage of the trees, they would strike the ground with great force, rebounding several feet. After being struck on the head by several stones,' I had no wish to have the performance repeated, and always sought shelter as soon as the bombardment began. The destruction caused by severe hail storms to the nests and young uf the mountain birds is at once apparent. Many species, finches, tanagers, Evening Grosbeaks and others, are found nesting until late in July in the Pyramid Peak region. Some of the late nests, perhaps, are the result of the earlier ones being destroyed by snow or jays; others contain second broods. The few notes transcribed below were hastily written down during the storm and after, and may prove of interest. Although almost two months were spent in the high Sierras in t92, bird study was a secondary consideration during the trip, and the nests examined were discovered by accident. Probably if a system- atic search had been made, many more victims of the storm would have been found. A mother Cassin Purple Finch continued to feed her young in a nest high up in a hemlock during a few hours of rain; at the first crashing downpour of the hail, the nestlings were silenced and the parent was seen no more. Other nests were examined during the week of storm, and in almost every case they were found abandoned, the young dead, the nests battered and soggy. We were informed of a nest of the Western Evening Grosbeak containing young birds, on the opposite shore of the lake, but on visiting that locality a day after- ward no traces of the birds could be found. Of the destruction of the nests of ground building birds, a single illustration will be sufficient. A nest with eggs of the White-crowned Sparrow was found in a situation usual with this species, in the shelter of bushes and growing vegeta- tion. In this instance the small, dense bush that sheltered the nest could have up-