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 [centered text] THE-CọNDỌR A MAGAZINE OF WESTERN ORNITHOLOGY [end of center text] [image of two birds]

Volume VI November-December, 1904 Number 0 [centered text] The Black-headed Grosbeak ( Zamelodia melanocepbala) BV WILLIAM LOVELL FINLEV ILLUSTRATED BY HERMAN T BOILMAN [end centered text]

I SHALL always remember the black-headed grosbeak because it is one of the birds of my childhood. As long ago as I can remember, I watched for him in the mulberry trees and about the elderberry bushes when the fruit was ripe. I distinguished him from all others by his high- pitched, "quit! quit!" long before I knew his name. He is a common resident of California. When I came to Oregon, it was some time before I found him. Here he seldom if ever comes about the city, but he likes a quiet nook out in the hills, a place where the maples and alders form a thicket in the creek bottom. [tab]For several years we have watched a pair of grosbeaks that spent their summer in a little thicket along Fulton Creek. I have no doubt the same pair has returned to the old nesting place for the last three or four years. It seems I can almost recognize the notes of their song. If our ears were only tuned to the music of the birds could we not recognize them as we recognize our old friends? [tab]Last year I found three spotted eggs in a loosely-made nest that was placed in the dog-wood. This year the site was scarcely twenty feet from the old home. They came nearer the ground and placed the thin frame-work of their home be-