18 IlUiwls State Laboratory of JS'atural History. 



I am informed by Mr. W. E. Pratt, that he found this 

 warbler in g-reat abundance along; the Kankakee River» 

 near English Lake, Ind.; and Mr. H. K. Coale found great 

 numbers of this species some sixty miles southeast of 

 Chicago, in Stark county, Indiana, along the Kankakee, 

 which river he regards as the northern limit of its breed- 

 ing range.* Mr. A. W. Butler, in his "Notes on the 

 Range of the Prothonotary Warbler in Indiana," an in- 

 teresting article published in the Ornithologist and Oolo- 

 gist (Vol. XTII., March, 1888), propounds the question 

 as to what route is chosen by the birds in reaching the 

 locality in which Mr. Coale found them. He speaks of 

 the warbler in this region as follows: 



"For several years, since making the acquaintance of 

 this attractive bird, Mr. Coale has visited the Kankakee 

 swamps in Stark county. Each year the warblers appear 

 to be as common and as ready to be studied as when he 

 first saw them. The northward range of this species, 

 however, does not stop here. Mr. Coale, in his persistent 

 searchings, has traced it to the shores of Lake Michigan, 

 along which he has occasionally taken it both in Indi- 

 ana and in Illinois." He continues, "Whether these birds 

 pass the narrow and almost imperceptible division be- 

 tween the drainage of the Wabash and the Kankakee, or 

 also extend their semi-annual pilgrimages along the latter 

 stream, remains to be determined. It seems certain, 

 however, that they must pass over the indistinguishable 

 watershed between Kankakee Valley and the Lake Basin, 

 the waters of which, at certain seasons of the year, find 

 common feeders in many swamps and lakes in north- 

 western Indiana. No barriers of any consequence being- 

 present, it seems probable that the Wabash Valley is the 

 route by which this species is distributed over the region 

 considered." 



So far, the distribution of the prothonotary warbler 

 has been traced only along the courses of the larger 

 rivers. Were we to follow it up the numerous tributa- 

 ries of these larger strea'ns, its range would be consid- 



•Nat. Hist. Surv. 111., Vol, I„ pp. 199, 120. 



