94 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. I50 



Resident. A recent addition to the avifauna that has increased 

 steadily in number since it was first recorded. 



This is a species of the Old World established by unknown means 

 in eastern South America (first recorded in Surinam) that has in- 

 creased and spread widely in recent years through that continent and 

 northward into the eastern United States. It was first reported for 

 Panama on August 14, 1954, when Dr. Eugene Eisenmann and Maj. 

 Francis Chapelle saw two at the Mindi dairy, between Fort Davis 

 and Gatun, Canal Zone. Three were observed by Chapelle near Maria 

 Chiquita, Colon, August 21, and others at the Mindi locality in Oc- 

 tober, to the number of 14 on October 30 (Eisenmann, Auk, 1955, p. 

 426). David Fairchild II wrote me at this same period of one seen 

 September 13, 1954, in the eastern suburbs of Panama City. And 

 Karl Curtis sent word of a hundred or so on November 14 walking 

 among the cattle on the savanna at the La Jagua Hunting Club. A 

 local hunter, Baldomiro Moreno, who has worked with me in this 

 region for years, from this date in November found them common 

 near La Jagua each year through the period of rains, but absent dur- 

 ing the dry season. 



On February 22, 1956, I noted 6 of these egrets near Las Lajas in 

 eastern Chiriqui among cattle in the shallow water of a flooded cienaga, 

 and saw 2 more on February 24. These were too wild to approach. I 

 saw one at La Jagua on February 22, 1957, and finally on March 20, 

 1958, Baldomiro and I shot two there, the first specimens of record 

 for the republic. These were nonbreeding birds taken from two 

 flocks of about 25 each that fed among cattle. On March 15, 1958, I 

 saw one in a wet meadow near Anton, Code. The following year I 

 recorded the cattle egret on January 31 near Juan Mina, C.Z., and 

 March 19 at El Salto, on the Rio Chucunaque, above Yavisa, Darien. 

 I noted half a dozen on April 1 1 at La Jagua and was told that there 

 were then many through the year. In 1960 on March 23 we recorded 

 one near San Felix, eastern Chiriqui, and 3 near Puerto Vidal, 

 Veraguas. At La Jagua I found about 100 on the marsh on March 

 27. Charles O. Handley, Jr., recorded one February 29, near Chan- 

 guinola, Bocas del Toro. On January 9, 1961, four rested in a bush 

 overhanging the Chagres, near Juan Mina. And on January 21, 1962, 

 I saw one with cattle near Guanico Arriba in southern Los Santos. 



These early records are given in detail, because of the interest at- 

 tendant on the increase of the species. It is obvious that the cattle 

 egret now is spread throughout the lowlands of the entire republic. In 

 1964 hundreds ranged with the herds of cattle along the Rio Tuira 



