Writing from Sikhim, Mr. Gammie says:--"I lately took the nest of
_Sitta cinnamomeiventris_ at 2000 feet. It was 20 feet from the ground
in a soft decaying bamboo on the edge of large jungle. The birds had
made a small hole just below an internode, and from the next internode
below had filled up the hollow of the bamboo with alternate layers of
green moss and pieces of tree-bark of about an inch or more square to
within a few inches of the entrance-hole. Each layer of moss was about
an inch thick, but the bark layer not more than a quarter of an inch,
the thickness of the bark itself. On the top of this pile, which was a
foot high, was a pad three inches wide by two in depth, of fine moss,
fur, a feather or two, and a few insects' wings intermixed, for the
eggs to rest on. The fur looks like that of a rat. There were four
hard-set eggs, which, unfortunately, got broken in the taking. One
of them only was measurable, and it was 0·65 inch by 0·5. I send the
shell-fragments to show the coloration."
317. Sitta neglecta, Walden. _The Burmese Nuthatch_.
Sitta neglecta, _Wald., Hume, cat._ no. 250 bis.
The Burmese Nuthatch probably breeds throughout Pegu and Tenasserim.
Of its nidification in the latter division Major C.T. Bingham
writes:--"On the 21st March, wandering about in a deserted clearing,
I saw a couple of Nuthatches (_Sitta neglecta_) flying to and from a
tree, carrying food apparently. Watching them closely with a pair of
binoculars, I saw them disappear near a knot in a branch. The tree was
a dead dry one and rather difficult to climb, but a peon of mine went
up and reported five young ones unfledged, the nest-hole being 6
inches deep, and the opening, which was originally a large one, and
probably caused by water wearing into the site of a broken branch,
narrowed by an edging of clay. The young lay on a layer of broken
leaves. As they were featherless, blind little things I left them
alone, and was delighted to see the parents continuing to feed them."
321. Sitta castaneiventris, Frankl. _The Chestnut-bellied Nuthatch_.
Sitta castaneoventris, _Frankl., Jerd. B. Ind._ i, p. 386.