290 An Ornithological Retrosfed. ' [zoE 



normal standard in annotated lists. It is not intended here to dwell 

 upon the first of the two phases — periodical abundance — many in- 

 stances, however, have come to knowledge through personal obser- 

 vations and reports and invariably in connection with meteorological 



phenomena. 



Concerning the decrease of certain birds and their very notice- 

 ably increased wildness, I have been much impressed by the 

 changes which have occurred within my own recollection, and more 

 particularly with the changes of the last forty years deduced from 

 the accounts of my father, D. S. Bryant, dating from May, 1850. 



In June, 1850, he first met with the yellow-billed magpie near 

 San Bruno (San Mateo County), and secured specimens without the 

 slightest difficulty. The birds were also found at San Mateo (San 

 Mateo County), at which place none have been seen since 1870 and 

 they doubtless disappeared even earlier. * 



Sixteen years ago my father and myself found the magpies com- 

 mon near Gilroy; they were somewhat shy and care was necessary 

 to approach within gun shot. They are now almost or quite absent 

 from that locality. The same remarks are appropriate for the 

 vicinity of Banta and Ellis, on the line of the railroad. Twenty-five 

 to thirty miles from Banta, on the west side of the San Joaquin 

 River, near Grayson, the birds were formerly (1878) common, but 

 now nearly exterminated from eating the carcasses of poisoned ani- 

 mals, and the few that I found there in 1885 were wild beyond all 

 possibility of approaching unconcealed. In March of the present 

 year, Mr. Belding and myself made a collecting trip to Valley 

 Springs (Calaveras County), where we found a few magpies, 

 and had no difficulty In walking openly to within gun shot until 

 after a gun had been fired, when they became exceedingly wild and 

 could only be shot by strategy. The decrease of this species seems 

 to me second only to that of the California vulture, and is plainly 

 attributable to poison, and the few (magpies, not vultures) that are 

 killed for scientific purposes and more that are sacrificed to the in- 

 satiable demands of the votaries of fashion. This species inhabits a 

 comparatively limited area and although not in a broad sense an 

 obnoxious bird will, unless some means are taken for its protection, 

 soon be included with the doomed birds of North America.* 



Zoe, i, 8, 284. 



