146 The Ottawa Naturalist. [Feb. 



met a good many on the trip. They were not using their 

 whistling call but the Ku-Ku-Ku which some of them repeated 

 endlessly ; in fact there were two which we concluded must have 

 made a bet as to which could say it the most times in a day, 

 and one of them stuck to it almost all day. Being an exceed- 

 ingly monotonous note, we both felt that we got very well 

 acquainted with it indeed, and should not forget it in a hurry. 

 At this point we saw the only solitary Sandpiper on the trip. 

 It was rather a surprise not to see more of these birds, as a great 

 deal of the country is well suited to them. The trip down the 

 stream into White Trout lake provided rather more walking 

 than we appreciated, as the portages were long and somewhat 

 arduous, but we met here our first Ruffed Grouse, Black- 

 backed Woodpecker, and Duck Hawk, the latter flying high 

 overhead while we were on one of the portages right opposite 

 a high cliff, which, however, did not look very suitable for nest- 

 ing on account of recent devastation by fire. 



On these portages we found numerous runs of field mice, 

 and subsequent trapping succeeded in getting a couple of them. 

 They seemed rather too reddish to be our southern form, but 

 this has not yet been definitely determined. The creek is wide 

 and well filled with stumps and grass for the last half mile before 

 it enters into the lake, and the banks are covered with dead and 

 dying timber, which made a very attractive spot for wood- 

 peckers. Here we became very well acquainted with a good 

 many notes of the Black-backed Woodpecker. Once or twice 

 we heard some genuine Blackbird notes [from a Rusty at 

 this point, but all the rest of the notes of that character 

 were from the woodpecker. Here, also, we met our first 

 Canada Jay or Whiskey Jack, a pair of which came flying 

 down to interview us at the end of one of the portages. We 

 tried to make friends with them, but they were not to be cajoled, 

 and the bread which we laid on top of a burnt stump remained 

 there untouched. As usual they were very quiet, but later on 

 we heard from them quite a variety of notes, mostly of a very 

 liquid character, and for the writer, not very easily described. 

 Their flight resembles that of the Blue Jay to a considerabe 

 extent, but there were differences which would make them 

 readily identifiable by one who was well acquainted. 



Paddling around the left corner of the entrance into the 

 White Trout lake we found the most beautiful camp of the trip 

 in a sandy bay which made excellent bathing. The level of 

 the woods was only about ten feet above the lake, and a beauti- 

 ful location was all ready for our tent, with a sun parlor over- 

 looking the bay. Here we stayed for two nights while we_ 

 trapped on the last portage and explored the nearby islands. 



