106 



THE OOLOGIST 



A Buzzard's Sense of Smell. 

 While paddling around Kale Kilby 

 near the town of Suffork, Virginia, on 

 the 31st of May last year, my compan- 

 ion, Mr. J. E. Gould of Norfolk, and 

 I notice<l on a dead stump ahead of 

 us, a Turkey Buzzard (Cathartes aura) 

 Drawing nearer, he seemed loath to 

 move and kept leaning over and peer- 

 ing into a hole about eight inches be- 

 low him. We became inquisitive also 

 and on pushing over the dead stump, 

 and breaking open the hole, found 

 two dead Yellow-shafted Flickers 

 (Colaptes auratus). These birds were 

 only partly decomposed and now that 

 Buzzard at the height he generally 

 sails, could detect them, still remains 

 a mystery to mc. 



H. H. BAILEY. 



Additional Notes on the Breeding of 

 Catharista urubu. 



On April 3rd, this year, I was out 

 in a large Cypress Swamp in Florida 

 collecting Black Vulture and Water 

 Turkey sets and taking photos of eggs 

 and young in situ of these species and 

 also the Wards Heron. 



I was up about ninety feet in a cy- 

 press engaged in the interesting opera- 

 tion of taking the picture of two young 

 Wardi about a month old I should 

 .iudge, as usual with this bird one of 

 the youngsters was a great deal larger 

 than the other and the largest one 

 seemed greatly worrried at my being 

 so near him, he had vomited up a 

 piece of a mocasin snake about four- 

 teen inches long when I first appeared 

 at the nest and I guess he was afraid 

 that I had designs on his breakfast 

 because every half minute or so lie 

 would stretch out his long neck and 

 pick up one end of this delicate mor- 

 sel and make as if to swallow it, but 

 he would always change his mind. I 

 waited fully half an hour in hopes he 



would so that I could get a picture of 

 the operation. During this wait I 

 looked about over the swamp to see 

 what was "doing" and happened to see 

 an old Black Vulture up in a Wardi 

 nest of last year from which I had 

 collected a set. I thought at first the 

 Buzzard was making a breakfast from 

 some of the remains of the young 

 Herons. Climbing up higher however 

 in the tree I was in I made out tho 

 that Mrs. Buzzard was evidently cov- 

 ering eggs. I had a free and unob- 

 structed view of her from where I was 

 and being only about twenty yards 

 away could see fine. She was sitting 

 broadside to me and had her head 

 tucked around to the off side so that 

 I could not at first see it and acted as 

 if she were hiding from me. I have 

 never noted this act in this species be- 

 fore as when you approach an incubat- 

 ing bird she is always nervous, etc. I 

 clapped my hands, and made all kinds 

 of noises but could not wake her up 

 so I called to my companion on the 

 ground to go to the tree and rap on 

 it, upon his doing this she woke up 

 and flew ofT at once and displayed two 

 of the nicest eggs of this species that 

 I have ever seen. Needless to say 

 that I came down from the tree I was 

 in and collected this set. They are 

 shorter and rounder than any other 

 sets of these I have and heavily mar- 

 ked and very handsome. In all my 

 observations of this bird this is the 

 first time I have ever found her breed- 

 ing so high up, possibly this swamp 

 had every available hollow log in use 

 by her friends and she was compelled 

 to go high. This nest was 85 feet up 



in a cypress. 



O. E. BAYNARD. 



