244 Trans. Acad. Sci. of St. Louis. 



migration through Kansas and Nebraska, rarely west to Wyom- 



ing- 



This species finds a place in our list on the strength of a single 

 record, it being reported by Mr. Geo. E. Stillwell from Kansas 

 City, Mo., March 20, 1882 (Bird migration in the Mississippi 

 Valley, Forest and Stream, 1882, p. 283). Since it has repeatedly 

 been taken in southeastern Nebraska it stands to reason that 

 its rarity as a transient visitant in Missouri is only apparent 

 and research along our western border will probably be re- 

 warded by discoveries which may enable us to remove it from 

 the rank of great rarities and place it with Baird's Sparrow, 

 McCown's and Chestnut-collared Longspurs among the regular 

 transients. 



Family Mimidae. Thrashers, etc. 

 *703. MiMUS POLYGLOTTUS (Linn.). Mockingbird. 



Turdus polyglottus. Mocker. 



Geog. Dist. — United States and Mexico; north to Maryland 

 (irregularly to Massachusetts), southern Ohio, Indiana, southern 

 Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska and eastern Colorado; rarely to 

 northern Illinois, Iowa and southern Wisconsin. Breeds 

 throughout its United States range and winters wherever it 

 breeds, but chiefly in the southern states and southward. 



In Missouri a fairly common summer resident in the southern 

 half of the state, rarer northward, but reaching the northern 

 border at Keokuk where Mr. Currier found it to be a rare breeder 

 in 1895, '96, '97, '98 and '99. At St. Joseph its occurrence. 

 May 2G, 1896, is regarded as accidental by Mr. S. S. Wilson, 

 though it is listed as a common breeder in southern Nebraska. 

 South of the Missouri River the species is partly a permanent 

 resident, rarely north of it, as at Fayette, Howard Co., Feb- 

 ruary 2, 1893. Unfortunately the tendency to winter at its 

 breeding places is a great drawback in the extension of its summer 

 range as many succumb to the severity of our winters. Those 

 that leave us in fall return very irregularly, some in the latter 

 half of March, most of them in April, the last not before early 

 May. Its withdrawal takes place in October. The Mocking- 

 bird seeks the friendship of man and where protected becomes 

 half-domesticated. Writing from Alexandria, Clark Co., Mr. 

 Jasper Bhncs says in Forest and Stream, vol. 31, p. 343: 

 "November 22, 1888. A few southern Mockingbirds reach this 



