February, 1919] 



The Ottawa Naturalist 



147 



June 15, but never more than two or three blooms 

 at a time. 



Calypso, Calypso bulbosa (Linnaeus) Oakes. 

 Never shall I forget the day when I first discovered 

 this exquisite and very local little orchid rightly 

 named after an immortal. It was on the mornmg 

 of May 15, 1918, whilst following up an equally 

 rare warbler, the Cape May (Dertdroica tigrina) to 

 the edge of a deep cedar swamp, that I had not pre- 

 viously explored, and which curiosity now promptfd 

 me to enter, that I came upon two blooms on the 

 moss-covered stump of a fallen tree. Needless to 

 say I spent a long time searching in a wide radius 

 round this spot, but I only succeeded in finding five 

 more blooms. This success, however, was sufficient 

 to make me ignore the birds for the rest of that day 

 and the one following, in an endeavour to def le the 

 extent of the area and the abundance or otb'^rwise 

 of the plant. I only succeeded, however, in locating 

 three more blooms (thus making a total of ten in 

 all) and each of these three were by themselves, one 

 at a distance of perhaps three-quarters of a mile, 

 another at about one-quarter of a mile, and the last 



only a few hundred yards from the original spot. 

 These three localities with the original one were all 

 within the long belt of woods lying to the north- 

 west of the village. 



It seems strange that in The Canadian Naturalist, 

 Gosse, 1840, a book of much local interest (as it 

 gives a general account of the Flora and Fauna of 

 the district in those times) the word Orchis occurs 

 only once, and that on page 299, where the author 

 (who lived at Compton, a village some seven miles 

 to the north-east of Hatley) on September 10, 1838, 

 or thereabouts, says: "I found an Orchis, consisting 

 of two very large oval leaves, deeply plaited, but it 

 had no flower". Considering that Gosse spent three 

 years at Compton it would appear as if orchids must 

 have been very scarce here in those days, or surely 

 he could hardly have failed to notice some of the 

 more showy ones. Probably the one he found was 

 C. acaule. 



In conclusion, I hope this preliminary list may be 

 the means of inducing others to try and add to it, 

 as I feel sure the possibilities of the place have only 

 been touched upon so far. 



BIRD LIFF IN THE ALBERTA WILDS. 



By J. Dewey Soper. 



When visiting western Alberta during the months 

 of October, November and December, in 1913, I 

 had an opportunity of studying, each day, many 

 species of winter birds which were then new to me. 

 The birds of that region, I believe, have had few 

 admirers at that date. In briefly sketching these I 

 am denied perhaps the satisfaction of viewing the 

 list as a complete exposition of the winter birds of 

 the region, but it seems, except in special instances, 

 that a great deal of our interesting contributions in 

 this direction is necessarily fragmentary, through lack 

 of adequate opportunity. 



We camped the entire period in the valley of 

 the Hay river, some thirty or thirty-five miles north 

 of the entrance to the Yellowhead Pass. This 

 country is reached by pack-horse from either Hinton 

 or Dyke. The Grande Prairie trail intersects this 

 region, and running roughly parallel to the first 

 majestic ranges of the Rockies, affords splendid 

 opportunities for viewing their grandeur. All of 

 those exceptionally fine mountains, Broule Roche, 

 Roche a Perdrix, and Roche Mutte, may be seen 

 from this trail. 



The country is rugged, with a mixed forest of 

 >v^ pine, spruce, poplar, and birch. Much of it has 

 k ^^vbeen burnt over by forest fires. The entire region is 

 ^y'^^ interspersed with numberless small lakes. 

 *-^ ^^ Large game and fur-bearers were not plentiful in 



the exact country we visited, due to persistent hunt- 

 ing by the Crees which inhabit it. 



The list may prove interesting, following as it 

 does, at an advanced season of the year, Riley's bird 

 list for practically the same region, also Taverner's 

 recent addendum to the same. 



(1) During the early part of October, the 

 Western Grebe {/Echmophorus occidentalis) was 

 tolerably common about the small lakes adjacent to 

 the Hay river valley. They occurred with greater 

 frequency, it seemed to me, on the lakes that had 

 no visible outlet. These perhaps possess more food 

 peculiar to their wants. Sometimes they were soli- 

 tary, but more often were observed m pairs. As the 

 days went by and the nights became colder they 

 became fewer in number and the last individuals 

 observed before the freeze-up was on October 28th. 



Later while travelling over the ice during the first 

 week in November, I found two of these birds 

 frozen down on the surface, both in a frail and starved 

 condition. It would be interesting to know the exact 

 circumstances which prevented these birds from 

 migrating earlier. Both individuals were found on 

 the same lake and only about a mile distant from the 

 open waters of the Hay river. 



(2) The Hudsonian Spruce Grouse (Can- 

 achites canadensis) was a very common bird in the 

 big woods and usually seen in flocks. When first 



-.(^ 



