THE OSPREY. 



135 



CALIFORNIA NOTES. 



EDITED BY DONALD A. COHEN, ALAMEDA, CAL. 



Mr. W. O. Emerson of Haywards informs us of 

 his intention to open up an art studio at I'acific 

 Grove, Monterey County soon, and to devote some 

 of his time to the water birds there. 



Mr. A. H. Frost of New York was reported in 

 San Francisco the last week of April. We are in- 

 formed that he has obtained a set of California 

 Vulture by purchase from Mr. H. R. Taylor. 



Mr. A. M. Shields is interested in sending two 

 Alameda naturalists, Mr. R. S. Wheeler and Mr. H. 

 C. Ward to Pyramid Lake, Nevada, to get some 

 eggs of the California Gull, Larns la/ifomuiis. 



May 7, Mr. Jos. Grinnell, of the Southern Division 

 has recently been staying in San Francisco prepara- 

 tory to leaving for Kotzebue Sound, Alaska. Mr. 

 Grinnell was present to-night at the Northern Divi- 

 sion meeting of the Cooper Club and says he expects 

 to be gone for two years. 



While on the salt marsh recently I observed a 

 Western Willet among a flock of several hundred 

 Western Sandpipers that passed close to my boat. 

 The Willet was trying hard to obtain the lead, as the 

 myriads of small wings were literally carrying it 

 along and its cries evidently indicated its discomfort. 



Another egg of California Vulture has come into 

 possession of Mr. H. R. Taylor since the one men- 

 tioned in May number. It is likewise a perfect 

 specimen. Mr. Wm. Steinbeck of Hollister reports 

 having obtained an egg through his collector. Con- 

 sidering the small number of eggs, perfect and im- 

 perfect specimens of this Condor now in possession 

 of various collectors and institutions it is remarkable 

 to add three in one year. 



A remarkable instance of a Sparrow Hawk depos- 

 iting eggs in an open nest is related by Mr. H. R. 

 Taylor, who states that, in an old hawk's nest, 35 

 feet from the ground, he found 3 eggs of the Desert 

 Sparrow Hawk, about April 15. The nest was 

 vacant on the 5th and unlined, while on the 15th it 

 was lined with dry grass, by the Desert Sparrow 

 Hawks, he thinks. Mr. Taylor took the eggs and 

 upon returning some days later found that the 4th 

 egg had been laid, the egg being in evidence. 



Some curiosities of bird architecture are in pos- 

 session of Mr. H. R. Taylor of Alameda, one being 

 a nest of Baltimore Oriole, taken by Mr. Benjamin 

 Hoag of Stephentown, N Y,, who says it has the 

 smallest entrance of any of this species he has 

 noticed The large diameter i 1-16 inches and the 

 small diameter i inch. A nest of the California Bush 

 Tit has the entrance on the top, instead of on the 

 side near the top. Another was lodged instead of 

 being pensile, and has a unique shape for one of 

 this species, being 5'/( inches long by 4;?^ inches 

 wide. It also has a flap at the center in place of the 

 usual small well rounded entrance. Another nest of 

 this species, taken by Mr Ernest Adams of San Jose, 

 has two entrances at the top, divided by a strip 

 barely an inch wide. 



A letter from a Stockton member of the Cooper 

 Ornithological Club, dated early this year, relates 

 the practice of a gang of Italians who draw nets of 

 fine mesh across the brush along the levees of the 

 San Joaquin River ; then they beat the brush with 

 sticks, driving into their nets all the birds in the 

 brush fringing the levees. It is said that they work 



this so well that not a bird escapes and they volun- 

 teered the statement that they have caught as many 

 as 2,000 birds in one day. The birds are used for 

 food or sold to restaurants, to the detriment of the 

 orchardist and the agriculturist. The Club has taken 

 the matter in hand and will take every means of sup- 

 pressing this vandalism and wholesale destruction of 

 insectivorous and song birds. The matter is being 

 given publicity and the attention of the State Game 

 Warden has been ordered called to the fact that the 

 law relating to the destruction of certain varieties of 

 birds is being broken, and of the State Entomologist 

 in regard to destroyers of noxious insects being indis- 

 criminately slaughtered. 



Mr. A. W. Anthony, one of the leading ornitholo- 

 gists of the west, is planning to spend the summer in 

 the Olympic Mountains of Washington. These 

 mountains are unknown so far a.s their zoology is 

 concerned, and Mr. Anthony, should he spend the 

 summer in them, will undoubtedly reap rich results. 

 Of course he will carry a camera. Mr. Anthony in 

 a recent letter makes the following corrections to 

 Mr. R. H. Beck's notes in the January Osprev on 

 the Booby's of Clarion Island: "Blue-footed and 

 Brewster's Boobys are not found at all on the island, 

 and the Red-faced Booby mentioned should have 

 been the Red-footed." Mr. Anthony's article on the 

 'Boobys of the Revillegigedo Islands,' which will 

 follow the article in the present number is illustrated 

 with six wonderfully interesting photographs of these 

 queer birds taken by the author during his last expe- 

 dition to these tropical islands of the Pacific. 



Recent Literature. 



Bird Studies. An account of the Land Birds of 

 Eastern North America. By IVilliain E. D. Scot/. 

 With illustrations from the original photographs. 

 New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Large octavo, 363 

 pages, 166 illustrations. $5.00. Portfolios of plates 

 50c each. 



A sumptuously made and illustrated book entitled 

 'Bird Studies,' extends to the constantly increasing 

 number of students of bird life an invitation to ob- 

 serve more intimately first the birds "about the 

 house," then those "along the highway," "in the 

 woods," "across the fields," "in marsh and swamp," 

 and finally "by stream and pond." By this method 

 of classification all the birds of eastern North Amer- 

 ica, from the fur countries to the Gulf and from the 

 Mississippi to the Atlantic, with the exception of the 

 water birds, have been represented; some most fully, 

 others by a mere line of text. In many instances a 

 more than usual amount of study and photography 

 has been devoted to the development of fledglings ; 

 but the text, as a whole, contains less information 

 than Chapman's ' Birds of Eastern North America,' 

 for example ; so that this new bird book must justify 

 its appearance in a crowded market by its unique 

 classification and lavish use of photographs. 



It is an easy matter to quarrel with any arrange- 

 ment that is not along accepted lines laid down by 

 ornithologists ; but the unconventional methods of 

 writers who hope to attract to the study of nature 

 many whom scientific names and rules bewilder or 

 repel, surely need no apology when one sees the great 

 stimulus these methods have given to out-of door ob- 

 servations. Mrs. William Starr Dana's ' How to Know 

 the Wild Flowers, ' divided into color groups, doubtless 

 has done more in a few years to popularize the study 

 of botany than Gray's learned treatises ever did. 



Birds have difi^erent chosen habitats at different 

 seasons and in different sections of the country to 



