After that first meeting the broad-tailed hummers were frequently seen in my rambles among the Rockies. In some places there were small colonies of them. They did not always dwell together in harmony, but often pursued one another like tiny furies, with a loud z-z-z-zip that meant defiance and war. The swiftness of their movements often excited my wonder, and it was difficult to see how they kept from impaling themselves on thorns or snags, so reckless were their lightning-like passages through the bushes and trees. When four or five of them were found in one place, they would fairly thread the air with green and purple as they described their circles and loops and festoons with a rapidity that fairly made my head whirl. At one place several of them grew very bold, dashing at me or wheeling around my head, coming so close that I could hear the susurrus of their wings as well as the sharp, challenging buzz from their throats.
Perhaps it would interest you to know where the rambler found these tiny hummers. They were never in the dark cañons and gorges, nor in the ravines that were heavily wooded with pine, but in the open, sunshiny glades and valleys, where there were green grass and bright flowers. In the upper part of both North and South Cheyenne Cañons they were plentiful, although they avoided the most scenic parts of these wonderful mountain gorges. Another place where they found a pleasant summer home was in a green pocket of the mountain above Red Cliff, a village on the western side of the great range. On descending the mountains to the town of Glenwood, I did not find them, and therefore am disposed to think that in the breeding season they do not choose to dwell in too low or too high an altitude, but seek suitable places at an elevation of from seven thousand to nine thousand feet.
Only a small portion of the peak is shown in the view. The comparatively level area referred to in the text lies back of the signal station on the crest. At a garbage heap near the building a flock of leucostictes were seen, and the writer was told that they came there regularly to feed. From this sublime height the American pipits rise on resilient wings hundreds of feet into the air until they disappear in the cerulean depths of the sky, singing all the while at "heaven's gate."
One day, while staying at Buena Vista, Colorado, I hired a saddle-horse and rode to Cottonwood Lake, twelve miles away, among the rugged mountains. The valley is wide enough here to admit of a good deal of sunshine, and therefore flowers studded the ground in places. It was here I saw the only female broad-tailed hummer that was met with in my rambles in the Rockies. She was flitting among the flowers, and did not make the buzzing sound that the males produce wherever found. She was not clad so elegantly as were her masculine relatives, for the throat-patch was white instead of purple, and the green on her back did not gleam so brightly. But, oddly enough, her sides and under tail-coverts were stained with a rufous tint—a color that does not appear at all in the costume of the male.
A curious habit of these hummers is worth describing. The males remain in the breeding haunts until the young are out of the nest and are beginning to be able to shift for themselves. Then the papas begin to disappear, and in about ten days all have gone, leaving the mothers and the youngsters to tarry about the summer home until the latter are strong enough to make the journey to some resort lower in the mountains or farther south. The reason the males do this is perhaps evident enough, for at a certain date the flowers upon whose sweets the birds largely subsist begin to grow scant, and so if they remained there would not be enough for all.
In the San Francisco Mountains of Arizona, Doctor Merriam found the broad-tails very abundant in the balsam timber and the upper part of the pine belt, where they breed in the latter part of July; after which they remain in that region until the middle of September, even though the weather often becomes quite frosty at night. At break of day, in spite of the cold, they will gather in large flocks at some spring to drink and bathe. Doctor Merriam says about them at such times:
"They were like swarms of bees, buzzing about one's head and darting to and fro in every direction. The air was full of them. They would drop down to the water, dip their feet and bellies, and rise and shoot away as if propelled by an unseen power. They would often dart at the face of an intruder as if bent on piercing the eye with their needle-like bills, and then poise for a moment almost within reach before turning, when they were again lost in the busy throng. Whether this act was prompted by curiosity or resentment I was not able to ascertain."
As has already been said, there is not always unruffled peace in the hummer family. Among the Rocky Mountains, and especially on the western side of the range, there dwells another little hummer called the rufous humming-bird, because the prevailing color of his plumage is reddish, and between this family and the broad-tails there exists a bitter feud. When, in the migrating season, a large number of both species gather together in a locality where there is a cluster of wild-flowers, the picture they make as they dart to and fro and bicker and fight for some choice blossom, their metallic colors flashing in the sun, is so brilliant as never to be forgotten by the spectator who is fortunate enough to witness it.
One June day a Denver & Rio Grande train bore the bird-lover from Colorado Springs to Pueblo, thence westward to the mountains, up the Grand Cañon of the Arkansas River, through the Royal Gorge, past the smiling, sunshiny upper mountain valleys, over the Divide at Tennessee Pass, and then down the western slopes to the next stopping-place, which was Red Cliff, a village nestling in a deep mountain ravine at the junction of Eagle River and Turkey Creek. The following day, a little after "peep o' dawn," I was out on the street, and was impressed by a song coming from the trees on the acclivity above the village. "Surely that is a new song," I said to myself; "and yet it seems to have a familiar air." A few minutes of hard climbing brought me near enough to get my glass on the little lyrist, and then I found it was only the house-wren! "How could you be led astray by so familiar a song?" you inquire. Well, that is the humiliating part of the incident, for I have been listening to the house-wren's gurgling sonata for some twenty years—rather more than less—and should have recognized it at once; only it must be remembered that I was in a strange place, and had my ears and eyes set for avian rarities, and therefore blundered.[5]
[5] On this incident I quote a personal note from my friend, Mr. Aiken: "The wren of the Rockies is the western house-wren, but is the same form as that found in the Mississippi Valley. It is quite possible that a difference in song may occur, but I have not noticed any."
To my surprise, I found many birds on those steep mountain sides, which were quite well timbered. Above the village a colony of cliff-swallows had a nesting place on the rugged face of a cliff, and were soaring about catching insects and attending to the wants of their greedy young.
Besides the species named, I here found warbling vireos, broad-tailed humming-birds, western nighthawks, ruby-crowned kinglets, magpies, summer warblers, mountain chickadees, western wood-pewees, Louisiana tanagers, long-crested jays, kingfishers, gray-headed juncos, red-shafted flickers, pygmy nuthatches, house-finches, mountain jays, and Clarke's nutcrackers. The only species noted here that had not previously been seen east of the Divide was the pygmy nuthatch, a little bird which scales the trunks and branches of trees like all his family, but which is restricted to the Rocky Mountains. Like the white-breasted nuthatch, he utters an alto call, "Yang! yang! yang!" only it is soft and low—a miniature edition of the call of its eastern relative.
A mountain chickadee's nest was also found, and here I heard for the first time one of these birds sing. Its performance was quite an affecting little minor whistle, usually composed of four distinct notes, though sometimes the vocalist contented himself with a song of two or three syllables. The ordinary run might be represented phonetically in this way, "Phee, ph-e-e-e, phe-phe," with the chief emphasis on the second syllable, which is considerably prolonged. The song is quite different from that of the black-capped chickadee both in the intoning and the technical arrangement, while it does not run so high in the scale, nor does it impress me as being quite so much of a minor strain, if such a distinction can be made in music. Both birds' tunes, however, have the character of being whistled.
Glenwood is a charming summer resort in Colorado on the western side of the Rocky Mountain range, and can be reached by both the Denver & Rio Grande and the Colorado Midland Railways. Beautifully situated in an open mountain valley, it possesses many attractions in the way of natural scenery, while the cool breezes blow down from the snow-mantled ranges gleaming in the distance, and the medicinal springs draw many tourists in search of health and recuperation.
My purpose, however, in visiting this idyllic spot—I went there from Red Cliff—was not primarily to view the scenery, nor to make use of the healing waters, but to gratify my thirst for bird-lore. Having spent some weeks in observing the avi-fauna east of the range, I had a curiosity to know something of bird life west of the great chain of alpine heights, and therefore I selected Glenwood as a fertile field in which to carry on some investigations. While my stay at this resort was all too short, it was of sufficient length to put me in possession of a number of facts that may prove to be of general interest.
For one thing I learned, somewhat to my surprise, that the avian fauna on both sides of the Divide is much the same. Indeed, with one exception—to be noted more at length hereafter—I found no birds on the western side that I had not previously seen on the eastern side, although a longer and minuter examination would undoubtedly have resulted in the discovery of a few species that are peculiar to the regions beyond the range. In the extreme western and southwestern portions of Colorado there are quite a number of species that are seldom or never seen in the eastern part of the State. However, keeping to the mountainous districts, and given the same altitude and other conditions, you will be likely to find the same kinds of feathered folk on both sides of the range. A few concrete cases will make this statement clear. The elevation of Glenwood is five thousand seven hundred and fifty-eight feet; that of Colorado Springs, five thousand nine hundred and ninety-two feet; and the climatic conditions otherwise are practically the same. Hence at both places the following species were found: Lazuli buntings, Arkansas goldfinches, American goldfinches, western wood-pewees, Arkansas kingbirds, Bullock's orioles, grassfinches, and catbirds. At the same time there were a number of species in both localities that have a more extensive vertical range, as, for example, the western robins, which were seen in many places from the bases of the mountains up to the timber-line, over eleven thousand five hundred feet above sea-level.
In the Grand Cañon of the Arkansas River. In cañons like this, their walls rising almost vertically from one thousand to fifteen hundred feet, few birds are to be seen. Occasionally a dove will fly from one side of the gorge to the other before the scurrying train. From below a magpie or a Clark's crow may sometimes be seen flying overhead across the fearful chasm from one wall to the other, turning its head at intervals as if to inspect and question the spectator over a thousand feet below.
The presence of practically the same avian fauna on both sides of the great range suggests some speculations as to their movements in the migrating season. Do those on the western side of the mountains travel over the towering summits from the eastern plains? Or do they come up from their southern winter homes by way of the valleys and plains west of the range? Undoubtedly the latter is the correct surmise, for there were birds at Glenwood that are never known to ascend far into the mountains, and should they attempt to cross the Divide in the early spring, they would surely perish in the intense cold of those elevated regions, where snow often falls even in June, July, and August. One can easily imagine some of the eastern and western residents meeting in the autumn on the plains at the southern extremity of the mountain range, dwelling together in some southern locality throughout the winter, and then, when spring approaches, taking their separate routes, part going east and part west of the range, for their breeding haunts in the North. More than likely they do not meet again until the following autumn. There are individuals, doubtless, that never catch a glimpse of the western side of the great American watershed, while others are deprived of the privilege of looking upon the majestic panoramas of the eastern side.
What has just been said applies, of course, only to those species that prefer to dwell in the lower altitudes. There are other species that find habitats to their taste in the most elevated localities, ranging at will in the summer time over the bald summits in the regions of perpetual snow. Among these may be mentioned the brown-capped leucostictes, the American pipits, the ravens, and Brewer's blackbirds. These species will often have the privilege of looking upon the scenery on both sides of the range, and you and I can scarcely repress a feeling of envy when we think of their happy freedom, and their frequent opportunities to go sightseeing.
While taking an early morning stroll along one of the streets of Glenwood, I caught sight of a new member of the phœbe family, its reddish breast and sides differentiating it from the familiar phœbe of the East. Afterwards I identified it as Say's phœbe, a distinctly western species. Its habits are like those of its eastern relative. A pair of Say's phœbes had placed their nest on a beam of a veranda, near the roof, where they could be seen carrying food to their young. My notes say nothing of their singing a tune or even uttering a chirp. This was my first observation of Say's phœbe, although, as will be seen, I subsequently saw one under somewhat peculiar circumstances.
Having spent all the time I could spare at Glenwood, one morning I boarded the eastward-bound train, and was soon whirling up through the sublime cañons of Grand and Eagle Rivers, keeping on the alert for such birds as I could see from the car-window. Few birds, as has been said, can be seen in the dark gorges of the mountains, the species that are most frequently descried being the turtle doves, with now and then a small flock of blackbirds. The open, sunlit valleys of the upper mountains, watered by the brawling streams, are much more to the liking of many birds, especially the mountain song-sparrows, the white-crowned sparrows, the green-tailed towhees, and Audubon's and Wilson's warblers. Up, up, for many miles the double-headed train crept, tooting and puffing hard, until at length it reached the highest point on the route, which is Tennessee Pass, through the tunnel of which it swept with a sullen roar, issuing into daylight on the eastern side, where the waters of the streams flow eastward instead of westward. The elevation of this tunnel is ten thousand four hundred and eighteen feet, which is still about a thousand feet below the timber-line. A minute after emerging from the tunnel's mouth I caught sight of a red-shafted flicker which went bolting across the narrow valley. The train swept down the valley for some miles, stopped long enough to have another engine coupled to the one that had brought us down from the tunnel, then wheeled to the left and began the ascent to the city of Leadville. This city is situated on a sloping plain on the mountain side, in full view of many bald mountain peaks whose gorges are filled with deep snow-drifts throughout the summer. For some purposes Leadville may be an exceedingly desirable city, but it has few attractions for the ornithologist. I took a long walk through a part of the city, and, whether you will believe it or not, I did not see a single bird outside of a cage, not even a house-finch or an English sparrow, nor did I see one tree in my entire stroll along the busy streets. The caged birds seen were a canary and a cardinal, and, oddly enough, both of them were singing, mayhap for very homesickness.
Why should a bird student tarry here? What was there to keep him in a birdless place like this? I decided to leave at once, and so, checking my baggage through to Buena Vista, I started afoot down the mountain side, determined to walk to Malta, a station five miles below, observing the birds along the way. Not a feathered lilter was seen until I had gone about a mile from Leadville, when a disconsolate robin appeared among some scraggy pine bushes, not uttering so much as a chirp by way of greeting.
A few minutes later I heard a vigorous and musical chirping in the pine bushes, and, turning aside, found a flock of small, finch-like birds. They flitted about so rapidly that it was impossible to get a good view of them with my glasses; but such glimpses as I obtained revealed a prevailing grayish, streaked with some darker color, while a glint of yellow in their wings and tails was displayed as the birds flew from bush to bush. When the wings were spread, a narrow bar of yellow or whitish-yellow seemed to stretch across them lengthwise, giving them a gauzy appearance. The birds remained together in a more or less compact flock. They uttered a loud, clear chirp that was almost musical, and also piped a quaint trill that was almost as low and harsh as that of the little clay-colored sparrow, although occasionally one would lift his voice to a much higher pitch. What were these tenants of the dry and piney mountain side? They were pine siskins, which I had ample opportunity to study in my rambles among the mountains in 1901.
A mile farther down, a lone mountain bluebird appeared in sight, perched on a gray stump on the gray hillside, and keeping as silent as if it were a crime in bluebird-land to utter a sound. This bird's breeding range extends from the plains to the timber-line; and he dwells on both sides of the mountains, for I met with him at Glenwood. About a half mile above Malta a western nighthawk was seen, hurtling in his eccentric, zigzag flight overhead, uttering his strident call, and "hawking for flies," as White of Selborne would phrase it. A western grassfinch flew over to some bushes with a morsel in its bill, but I could not discover its nest or young, search as I would. Afterwards it perched on a telegraph wire and poured out its evening voluntary, which was the precise duplicate of the trills of the grassfinches of eastern North America. There seems to be only a slight difference between the eastern and western forms of these birds, so slight, indeed, that they can be distinguished only by having the birds in hand.
Turtle doves were also plentiful in the valley above Malta, as they were in most suitable localities. Here were also several western robins, one of which saluted me with a cheerful carol, whose tone and syllabling were exactly like those of the merry redbreast of our Eastern States. I was delighted to find the sweet-voiced white-crowned sparrows tenants of this valley, although they were not so abundant here as they had been a little over a week before in the hollows below the summit of Pike's Peak. But what was the bird which was singing so blithely a short distance up the slope? He remained hidden until I drew near, when he ran off on the ground like a frightened doe, and was soon ensconced in a sage bush. Note his chestnut crest and greenish back. This is the green-tailed towhee. He is one of the finest vocalists of the Rocky Mountains, his tones being strong and well modulated, his execution almost perfect as to technique, and his entire song characterized by a quality that might be defined as human expressiveness.
A pair of western chipping sparrows were feeding their young in one of the sage bushes. I hoped to find a nest, but my quest simply proved that the bantlings had already left their nurseries. It was some satisfaction, however, to establish the fact at first hand that the western chipping sparrows breed at an elevation of nine thousand five hundred and eighty feet above sea-level.
While strolling about a short distance above the town, I discovered an underground passage leading to some of the factories, or perhaps the smelting works, a few miles farther up the valley. The over-arching ground and timbers forming the roof were broken through at various places, making convenient openings for the unwary pedestrian to tumble through should he venture to stroll about here by night. Suddenly a little broad-shouldered bird appeared from some mysterious quarter, and flitted silently about from bush to bush or from one tussock of grass to another. To my surprise, he presently dropped into one of the openings of the subterranean passage, disappeared for a few moments, and then emerged from another opening a little farther away. The bird—let me say at once—was Say's phœbe, with which, as previously told, I made acquaintance at Glenwood. He may be recognized by the reddish or cinnamon-brown cast of his abdomen and sides. Again and again he darted into the passage, perhaps to make sure that his bairns had not been kidnapped, and then came up to keep a vigilant eye on his visitor, whom he was not wholly disposed to trust. I am not sure that there was a nest in the subterranean passage, as my time was too short to look for it. Others may not regard it as an important ornithological discovery, and I do not pretend that it was epoch-making, but to me it was at least interesting to find this species, which was new to me, dwelling at an elevation of five thousand seven hundred and fifty-eight feet on the western side of the range, and on the eastern side at an elevation of nine thousand five hundred and eighty feet. Nowhere else in my peregrinations among the Rockies did I so much as catch a glimpse of Say's phœbe.[6]
[6] In 1901 this bird was seen by me in South Park, and its quaint whistle was heard,—it says Phe-by, but its tone and expression are different from those of its eastern relative. See the chapter entitled "Pleasant Outings."
With the exception of some swallows circling about in the air, I saw no other birds during my brief stay at Malta. I was sorely disappointed in not being able to find accommodation at this place, for it had been my intention to remain here for the night, and walk the next day to a station called Granite, some seventeen miles farther down the valley, making observations on bird life in the region by the way. To this day I regret that my calculations went "agley"; but I was told that accommodation was not to be secured at Malta "for love or money," and so I shook the dust from my feet, and boarded an evening train for my next stopping-place, which was Buena Vista.
The elevation of this beautiful mountain town is seven thousand nine hundred and sixty-seven feet. It nestles amid cottonwood trees and green meadows in a wide valley or park, and is flanked on the east by the rolling and roaring Arkansas River, while to the west the plain slopes up gradually to the foothills of the three towering college peaks,—Harvard, Yale, and Princeton,—crowned all the year with snow. And here were birds in plenty. Before daybreak the avian concert began with the shrieking of the western wood-pewees—a vocal performance that they, in their innocence, seriously mistake for melody—and continued until night had again settled on the vale. In this place I spent three or four days, giving myself up to my favorite study and pastime, and a list of all the birds that I saw in the neighborhood would surprise the reader. However, a mere catalogue would be of slight interest, I apprehend, and therefore mention will be made only of those species which I had not seen elsewhere, passing by such familiar feathered folk as the Arkansas goldfinches, catbirds, western meadow-larks, Brewer's blackbirds, house-finches, green-tailed towhees, magpies, long-crested jays, summer warblers, and many others, begging their pardon, of course, for paying them such scant courtesy.
Early on a bright morning I was following one of the streets of the village, when, on reaching the suburbs, I was greeted by a blithe, dulcet trill which could come from no other vocalist than the song-sparrow. His tones and vocalization were precisely like those of Melospiza fasciata, to which I have so often listened in my native State of Ohio. It was a dulcet strain, and stirred memories half sad, half glad, of many a charming ramble about my eastern home when the song-sparrows were the chief choralists in the outdoor opera festival. Peering into the bushes that fringed the gurgling mountain brook, I soon caught sight of the little triller, and found that, so far as I could distinguish them with my field-glass, his markings were just like those of his eastern relative—the same mottled breast, with the large dusky blotch in the centre.
Delighted as I was with the bird's aria, I could not decide whether this was the common song-sparrow or the mountain song-sparrow. Something over a week earlier I had seen what I took to be the mountain song-sparrow in a green nook below the summit of Pike's Peak, and had noted his trill as a rather shabby performance in comparison with the tinkling chansons of the song-sparrow of the East. Had I mistaken some other bird for the mountain song-sparrow? Or was the Buena Vista bird the common song-sparrow which had gone entirely beyond its Colorado range? Consulting Professor W. W. Cooke's list of Colorado birds, I found that Melospiza fasciata is marked "migratory, rare," and has been known thus far only in the extreme eastern part of the State; whereas Melospiza fasciata montana is a summer resident, "common throughout the State in migration, and not uncommon as a breeder from the plains to eight thousand feet."
But Professor Cooke fails to give a clue to the song of either variety, and therefore my little problem remains unsolved, as I could not think of taking the life of a dulcet-voiced bird merely to discover whether it should have "montana" affixed to its scientific name or not. All I can say is, if this soloist was a mountain song-sparrow, he reproduced exactly the trills of his half-brothers of the East.[7] On the morning of my departure from Buena Vista another song-sparrow sang his matins, in loud, clear tones among the bushes of a stream that flowed through the town, ringing quite a number of changes in his tune, all of them familiar to my ear from long acquaintance with the eastern forms of the Melospiza subfamily.
[7] The problem has since been solved, through the aid of Mr. Aiken. The Buena Vista bird was montana, while the bird in the Pike's Peak hollow was Lincoln's sparrow.
How well I recall a rainy afternoon during my stay at Buena Vista! The rain was not so much of a downpour as to drive me indoors, although it made rambling in the bushes somewhat unpleasant. What was this haunting song that rose from a thick copse fringing one of the babbling mountain brooks? It mingled sweetly with the patter of the rain upon the leaves. Surely it was the song of the veery thrush! The same rich, melodious strain, sounding as if it were blown through a wind-harp, setting all the strings a-tune at the same time. Too long and closely had I studied the veery's minstrelsy in his summer haunts in northern Minnesota to be deceived now—unless, indeed, this fertile avian region produced another thrush which whistled precisely the same tune. The bird's alarm-call was also like that of the veery. The few glimpses he permitted of his flitting, shadowy form convinced me that he must be a veery, and so I entered him in my note-book.
But on looking up the matter—for the bird student must aim at accuracy—what was my surprise to find that the Colorado ornithologists have decided that the veery thrush is not a resident of the State, nor even an occasional visitor! Of course I could not set up my judgment against that of those scientific gentlemen. But what could this minstrel be? I wrote to my friend, Mr. Charles E. Aiken, of Colorado Springs, who replied that the bird was undoubtedly the willow thrush, which is the western representative of the veery. I am willing to abide by this decision, especially as Ridgway indicates in his Manual that there is very little difference in the coloration of the two varieties. One more mile-post had been passed in my never-ending ornithological journey—I had learned for myself and others that the willow thrush of the Rockies and the veery of our Eastern and Middle States have practically the same musical repertory, and nowhere in the East or the West is sweeter and more haunting avian minstrelsy to be heard, if only it did not give one that sad feeling which Heine calls Heimweh!
"You will find a small lake just about a mile from town. Follow the road leading out this way"—indicating the direction—"until you come to a red gate. The lake is private property, but you can go right in, as you don't shoot. No one will drive you out. I think you will find it an interesting place for bird study."
The foregoing is what my landlord told me one morning at Buena Vista. Nor did I waste time in finding the way to the lake, a small sheet of water, as clear as crystal, embowered in the lovely park lying between towering, snow-clad mountains. One might almost call the spot a bird's Arcadia. In no place, in all my tramping among the Rockies, did I find so many birds in an equal area.
In the green, irrigated meadow bordering one side of the sheet of water, I was pleased to find a number of Brewer's blackbirds busily gathering food in the wet grass for their young. And who or what are Brewer's blackbirds? In the East, the purple and bronzed grackles, or crow blackbirds, are found in great abundance; but in Colorado these birds are replaced by Brewer's blackbirds, which closely resemble their eastern kinsfolk, although not quite so large. The iridescence of the plumage is somewhat different in the two species, but in both the golden eye-balls show white at a distance. When I first saw a couple of Brewer's blackbirds stalking featly about on a lawn at Manitou, digging worms and grubs out of the sod, I simply put them down in my note-book as bronzed or purple grackles—an error that had to be corrected afterwards, on more careful examination. The mistake shows how close is the resemblance between the two species.
The Brewer division of the family breed on the plains and in the mountains, to an altitude of ten thousand feet, always selecting marshy places for their early summer home; then in August and September, the breeding season over, large flocks of old and young ascend to the regions above the timber-line, about thirteen thousand feet above sea-level, where they swarm over the grassy but treeless mountain sides in search of food. In October they retire to the plains, in advance of the austere weather of the great altitudes, and soon the majority of them hie to a blander climate than Colorado affords in winter.
Still more interesting to me was the large colony of yellow-headed blackbirds that had taken up their residence in the rushes and flags of the upper end of the lake. These birds are not such exclusive westerners as their ebon-hued cousins just described; for I found them breeding at Lake Minnetonka, near Minneapolis, Minnesota, a few years ago, and they sometimes straggle, I believe, as far east as Ohio. A most beautiful bird is this member of the Icteridæ family, a kind of Beau Brummel among his fellows, with his glossy black coat and rich yellow—and even orange, in highest feather—mantle covering the whole head, neck, and breast, and a large white, decorative spot on the wings, showing plainly in flight. He is the handsomest blackbird with which I am acquainted.
At the time of my visit to the lake, the latter part of June, the yellow-heads were busy feeding their young, many of which had already left the nest. From the shore, I could see dozens of them clinging to the reeds, several of which they would grasp with the claws of each foot, their little legs straddled far apart, the flexile rushes spreading out beneath their weight. There the youngsters perched, without seeming to feel any discomfort from their strained position. And what a racket they made when the parent birds returned from an excursion to distant meadows and lawns, with bill-some tidbits! They were certainly a hungry lot of bairns. When I waded out into the shallow water toward their rushy home, the old birds became quite uneasy, circling about above me like the red-wings, and uttering a harsh blackbird "chack," varied at intervals by a loud, and not unmusical, chirp.
You should see the nest of the yellow-head. It is really a fine structure, showing no small amount of artistic skill—a plaited cup, looking almost as if it had been woven by human hands, the rushes of the rim and sides folding the supporting reeds in their loops. Thus the nest and its reedy pillars are firmly bound together. I waded out to a clump of rushes and found one nest with three eggs in its softly felted cup—the promise, no doubt, of a belated, or possibly a second, brood.
This mountain lake was also the abode of a number of species of ducks, not all of which could be identified, on account of the distance they constantly put between themselves and the observer. Flocks of them floated like light, feathered craft upon the silvery bosom of the lake, now pursuing one another, now drifting lazily, now diving, and anon playing many attractive gambols.
One of the most curious ducks I have ever seen was the ruddy duck, called in the scientific manuals Erismatura rubida. As I sat on a rock on the shore, watching the aquatic fowl, one of the male ruddy ducks, accompanied by three or four females, swam out from the reeds into an open space where I could see him plainly with my field-glass. A beautiful picture he presented, as he glided proudly about on the water, surrounded by his devoted harem. Imagine, if you can, how regal he must have appeared—his broad, flat bill, light blue, widening out at the commissure, and seeming to shade off into the large white cheeks, which looked like snowy puffballs on the sides of his head; his crown, black and tapering; his neck, back, and sides, a rich, glossy brownish-red; his lower parts, "silky, silvery white, 'watered' with dusky, yielding, gray undulations"; and his wing-coverts and jauntily perked-up tail, black. If that was not a picture worthy of an artist's brush I have never seen one in the outdoor world.
No less quaint was his conduct. That he was proud and self-conscious, no one seeing him could doubt; and it was just as plain from his consequential mien, that he was posing before his train of plainly clad wives, who, no doubt, looked upon him as the greatest "catch" of the lake. Unlike most ducks, in swimming this haughty major carries his head erect, and even bent backward at a sharp angle; and his short tail is cocked up and bent forward, so that his glossy back forms a graceful half-circle or more, and does not slope downward, as do the backs of most ducks on the water.
Of all the odd gestures, this fellow's carried off the palm. He would draw his head up and back, then thrust it forward a few inches, extend his blue bill in a horizontal line, and at the same time emit a low, coarse squawk that I could barely hear. Oddly enough, all the females, staid as they were, imitated their liege lord's deportment. It was their way of protesting against my ill-bred intrusion into their demesne.
Presently a second male came out into the open space, accompanied by a retinue of wives, and then a third emerged, similarly attended. With this there was a challenging among the rivals that was interesting to witness; they fairly strutted about on the water, now advancing, now retreating, and occasionally almost, but never quite, closing in combat. Sometimes one would pursue another for a rod or more, in a swift rush that would make the spray fly and cut a swath on the smooth bosom of the lake.
Several coots now appeared on the scene. Between them and the ruddy ducks there seemed to be a feud of more or less intensity, each being on the offensive or the defensive as the exigencies of naval warfare demanded. Once I was moved to laughter as a coot made a fierce dash toward one of the ducks, and was almost upon her, and I thought she was destined to receive a severe trouncing, when she suddenly dodged her pursuer by diving. He just as suddenly gave up the chase, looking as if it were a case of "sour grapes," anyway.
After watching the antics of these birds for a long time, I turned my attention to another pretty scene,—a pair of coots leading their family of eight or ten little ones out into the clear area from their hiding-place among the reeds, presenting a picture of unruffled domestic bliss. How sweet and innocent the little coots were! Instead of the black heads and necks of their parents, and the white bills and frontal bones, these parts were tinted with red, which appeared quite bright and gauze-like in the sunshine.
The process of feeding the juvenile birds was interesting. The parents would swim about, then suddenly dip their heads into the water, or else dive clear under, coming up with slugs in their bills. Turning to the youngsters, which were always close upon their heels—or perhaps I would better say their tails—they would hold out their bills, when the little ones would swim up and pick off the toothsome morsel. It must not be supposed that the bantlings opened their mouths, as most young birds do, to receive the tidbits. No, indeed! That is not coot vogue. The little ones picked the insects from the sides of the papa's or mamma's beak, turning their own little heads cunningly to one side as they helped themselves to their luncheon.
The other waterfowl of the lake acted in an ordinary way, and therefore need no description. It was strange, however, that this was the only lake seen in all my Rocky Mountain touring where I found waterfowl. At Seven Lakes, Moraine Lake, and others in the vicinity of Pike's Peak, not a duck, crane, or coot was to be seen; and the same was true of Cottonwood Lake, twelve miles from Buena Vista, right in the heart of the rugged mountains.
Two facts may account for the abundance of birds at the little lake near Buena Vista; first, here they were protected from gunners and pot hunters by the owner, whose residence commanded a full view of the whole area; and, second, large spaces of the upper end of the lake was thickly grown with flags and rushes, which were cut off from the shore by a watery space of considerable breadth. In this place these birds found coverts from enemies and suitable sites for their nests.
It shall be my purpose in this chapter to describe with more or less fulness a number of Rocky Mountain birds which have either not been mentioned in previous chapters or have received only casual attention.
On reaching Colorado one is surprised to find none of our common blue jays which are so abundant in the Eastern and Middle States. In my numerous Rocky Mountain jaunts not one was seen. Yet this region does not need to go begging for jays, only they belong to different groups of the Garrulinæ subfamily. The most abundant and conspicuous of these western forms are the long-crested jays, so called on account of the long tuft of black feathers adorning the occiput. This distinguishing mark is not like the firm pyramidal crest of the eastern jay, but is longer and narrower, and so flexible that it sways back and forth as the bird flits from branch to branch or takes a hop-skip-and-jump over the ground. Its owner can raise and lower it at will.
The forehead of this jay is prettily sprinkled with white; his head and neck are black, in decided contrast with the umber-brown of the back; his rump and belly are pale blue, and his wings and tail are rich indigo-blue, somewhat iridescent and widely barred with black. Thus it will be seen that he has quite a different costume from that of our eastern jay, with his gaudy trimmings of white and black and purplish blue. The westerner cannot boast of cristata's dressy black collar, but otherwise he is more richly attired, although he may not be quite so showy.
The long-crested jays have a wide range among the mountains, breeding from the base of the foothills to the timber-line, although their nests are not commonly found below an altitude of seven thousand feet. In many places from nine to eleven thousand feet up the acclivities of the mountains they were seen flitting among the pines or the quaking asps. Like their eastern relatives, some individuals seem to prefer the society of man, dwelling in the villages or in the vicinity of country homes, while others choose the most secluded and solitary localities for their habitat. The fact is, I rarely made an excursion anywhere without sooner or later discovering that these jays had pre-empted the place for feeding or breeding purposes, sometimes with loud objurgations bidding me be gone, and at other times making no to-do whatever over my intrusion. Perhaps the proximity or remoteness of their nests was the chief cause of this variableness in their behavior.
A pretty picture is one of these jays mounting from branch to branch around the stem of a pine tree, from the lower limbs to the top, as if he were ascending a spiral staircase. This seems to be one of their regulation habits when they find themselves under inspection. If you intrude on their domestic precincts, their cry is quite harsh, and bears no resemblance to the quaint calls of the eastern jays; nor does the plaintive note of the eastern representative, so frequently heard in the autumnal woods, ever issue from any of the numerous jay throats of the West.
Far be it from me to blacken the reputation of any bird, but there is at least circumstantial evidence that the long-crested jay, like his eastern cousin, is a nest robber; for such birds as robins, tanagers, flycatchers, and vireos make war upon him whenever he comes within their breeding districts, and this would indicate that they are only too well aware of his predatory habits. More than that, he has the sly and stealthy manners of the sneak-thief and the brigand. Of course, he is by no means an unmixed evil, for you will often see him leaping about on the lawns, capturing beetles and worms which would surely be injurious to vegetation if allowed to live and multiply.
There are other jays in the Rockies that deserve attention. The Rocky Mountain jay—Perisoneus canadensis capitalis—is a bird of the higher altitudes, remaining near the timber-line all the year round, braving the most rigorous weather and the fiercest mountain storms during the winter. Although not an attractive species, his hardiness invests him with not a little interest. One can imagine him seeking a covert in the dense pineries when a storm sweeps down from the bald, snow-mantled summits, squawking his disapproval of the ferocity of old Boreas, and yet able to resist his most violent onsets.