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 Sept., I9o41 THE CONDOR I29 tained four each. Do the pelicans keep tab on the number of fish stowed away in the pouch, and stop at a certain figure ? The old birds for the most part did not come near the island while we were there. Now and again, however, a line of six or eight would circle about above us, out of gunshot, turn their heads so as to look down upon us as they passed over, and then return to their companions. Soon after we set out to return to the mainland a "committee" of six inspected the premises, flying around the island several times but did not alight. This manecurer was repeated several times, though not by the same number of birds. Finally, when we were more than a half mile distant, an old bird dropped down upon the island, and soon others came, usually flying in lines, all the birds back of the leader flapping their wings, or sailing, as he did, this characteristic giving them a strange, machine-like ap- pearance. It was not long before all the pelicans in sight were upon, or about, the island, glad no doubt, to resume the even tenor of the life which had been so rudely disturbed by intruders. Provo ity, Utah. Notes on Unusual Nesting Sites of the Pacific Yellow-throat BY A. V'. JOHNSON N exceptionally heavy rainfall in the autumn of x9o3 and spring of i9o4 flooded all the low-lying lands at the northern end of Clear Lake, Califor- nia. The whole of the tule lands, covering hundreds of acres were still under water at the end of May. In normal seasons the old clumps of tules on and near to the lake shore, and in and around the many ponds and sloughs in the vi- cinity, afford favorite nesting cites to bicolored and yellow-headed blackbirds, song sparrows, tule wrens, and also to great numbers of that charming little bird, the Pacific yellow-throat ( Geothlypis trichas arizela). The object of this paper is to give some little account of the admirable way in which the yellow-throats rose to the occasion and adapted themselves to new and changed conditions. Nearly all the nesting sites' noted must, I think, be looked upon as more or less abnormal. From May 4 to July x2, 9o4, I examined over sixty nests containing either eggs or young, and in addition many others in course of construction. A remarkable divergence in the choice of nesting sites is shown by different pairs, both as to situation and proximity to water. Very few nests were built right on the ground; far more, notably those placed amongst tangled grass and weeds and in growing barley, were raised slightly above it from two to six inches as a rule, while nests built in trees and bushes ranged all the way from a foot to twenty-two feet eleven inches above the ground. Ten nests were in black oak trees, mostly in thick bunches of mistletoe grow- ing on the trees, and varied in height from five feet to seventeen feet six inches, actual measurement. Two nests were in cypress trees, one each in blue gum and cottonwood, six in olive trees in an orchard one hundred yards from water; many we, re in willows, standing in shallow water and in alder bushes bordering sloughs; others were in patches of wild rose bushes close to alake, slough or stream. One nest'was found in a cultivated rose bush trained against the side of a house, an- other affixed to stalks of alfalfa, while a third was built in the middle of a dwarf sun-