C. II. Merriam — Birch of Connecticut. 93 



myself observed it in Tdulio, Wyoming, and Utali. It was once 

 common througliout New England, as attested by numerous old 

 writers. Josselyn must have been blessed with a keen appetite and 

 an admirable digestion, for he says : "The turkie-buzzard, a kind of 

 kite, but as big as a turkie ; brown of color, and very good meat."* 



Note. — The Black Vulture, Cathartes atratus (Ray) Lesson, may 

 sometimes occur as a rare straggler from the South, and the Rev. J. 

 Howard Hand writes me that he thinks he has killed three specimens 

 of it at Westbrook, Conn. (Aug. 10, Sept. 12 and 21, 1874), but they 

 may have been young Turkey Buzzards. Unfortunately the speci- 

 mens were not preserved. Several individuals have been recorded 

 from Massachusetts,! and it has even straggled as far north as Maine 

 (Calais, G. A. Boardmau)| and Nova Scotia. 



Family, COLUMBID^. 



171. Ectopistes migratoria (Linne) Swainson. Wild Pigeon. 



Sometimes quite abundant during the migrations. A few breed 

 (late in May). Arrives al>out the first of April (A])r. 2, 1875, Sage). 

 Mr. Coe tells me that numbers of them bred about Portland, Conn, 

 in 1875, and that a few generally nest there. 



Concerning the enormous flocks of Wild Pigeons wdiich passed to 

 and fro over the country in former years (and which, on a smaller 

 scale, are still to be met with in some parts of the West), Crov. Thomas 

 Dudley wrote, as early as 1G:31 : " V])on the 8 of March, from after 

 it was faire day light, untill al)()ut S of the clock in the forenoone 

 there flew over all the tonnes in our ])lantacons soe many flocks of 

 doues, each flock conteyning many thousands and some soe many 

 that they ol)scured the lighte, that it passeth credit, if but the truth 

 should bee written, and the thing was the more strange, l)ecause T 

 scarce remember to have scene tenne doues since 1 came into the 

 country. They were all turtles as a]i]ieared by diverse of them wee 

 killed flying, somewhat lugger than those of Europe, and they flew 

 from the north east to the south west ; but what it portends I know 

 not."§ And in the following year (1632), Thomas Morton, of Clif- 



* New England's Rarities Discovered. By John Josselyn, p. 11, 1672. 

 f Cones' List of the Birds of New England, p. 6, 1868 ; J. A. Allen's Rarer Birds 

 of Mass., p. 47, 1869; etc. 



X Am. Nat., vol. iii, p. 498, Nov., 1869. 



§ Reprinted in Force's Historical Tracts, Tract 4, p. 17-18. 



