56 



Bird -Lore 



tected from loo much slaughter in the 

 name of sport, and their eggs and young 

 arc guarded from cats," "which," they 

 add, "probably do as much damage to the 

 young of our small, useful birds near our 

 towns and cities as all other agencies 

 combined." — F. M. C. 



The Ornithological Magazines 



The Condor. — The autumn number of 

 The Condor,' which is usually published 

 about the middle of September, appears 

 this time under date of October 15 and 

 contains only three general articles. The 

 first paper is one of the occasional techni- 

 cal studies which are always welcome 

 contributions to our knowledge of the 

 systematic relationships and distribution 

 of some group. This paper, by H. S. 

 Swarth, is devoted to 'A Revision of the 

 California Forms of Plpilo maculalus,' 

 the Spotted Towhee. Six subspecies are 

 recognized as occurring in California, three 

 of which are of general distribution. One 

 of these, the Sacramento Towhee (P. m. 

 falciiielliis) is described as new, based on 

 a specimen from the Marysville Buttes 

 in Sutter County, and, as its name indi- 

 cates, it ranges throughout the Sacra- 

 mento and San Joaquin valleys. The San 

 Francisco Towhee {P. m. falcifer) ranges 

 along the coast from the northern border 

 of the state to San Luis Obispo County, 

 while the Spurred Towhee {P. m. megal- 

 onyx) occupies the southern coast region. 

 The other three forms are very limited 

 in distribution. The Oregon Towhee is 

 represented by a single specimen collected 

 on San Clemente Island; the Nevada 

 Towhee is restricted to the Warners 

 Mountain region in the northeastern 

 corner of the state, and the San Clemente 

 Towhee is found only on San Clemente and 

 Santa Catalina Islands. 



'An Unusual Nesting Site of the Mal- 

 lard' on Columbia Slough, Oregon, is des- 

 cribed by O. J. Murie. The nest, built 

 in the crotch of an ash tree, 9 feet from 

 the ground, contained 10 eggs. Nine of 

 these eggs hatched safely and the young 

 birds evidently found their way to the 



water nearby but the author was too late 

 to observe their transfer from the nest. 



Under the title 'Call-notes and Man- 

 nerisms of the Wren-tit,' Joseph Grinnell 

 recognizes seven distinct kinds of notes 

 and comments on several inaccuracies 

 regarding the habits ascribed to this bird. 



Among the shorter notes are several 

 records by Allan Brooks including those of 

 a Water Turkey (Anhinga anhinga) seen 

 on the California side of the Colorado 

 River, Feb. 9, 19 13; an eastern Phoebe 

 collected at Moss Beach March 7, 1913; 

 and a Bryant's Marsh Sparrow taken at 

 Carpinteria, Calif., Dec. 23, 191 2, the 

 last being the southernmost occurrence of 

 this bird thus far recorded. 



In a timely review Grinnell criticizes 

 certain inaccuracies in a 'Check-List of 

 the Birds of the Sequoia National Park,' 

 mentioning five deviations from the A. O. 

 U. 'Check-List' and ten very question- 

 able records in a list of 184 species. It is 

 true that these should not have occurred 

 but we venture to say that examination 

 of a carefully annotated copy of the A. 

 O. U. 'Check-List' would show a sur- 

 prisingly large number of corrections of 

 various kinds even in this standard ref- 

 erence book. No paper is free from mis- 

 takes and when they occur they should be 

 corrected. Now that attention has been 

 called to the Sequoia Park bird-list, we 

 trust that the next edition will have the 

 errors corrected and be otherwise im- 

 proved. In time we should have an accu- 

 rate and well annotated list of the birds 

 of each of the National Parks. — T. S. P. 



The Wilson Bulletin (No. 84, Sept. i, 

 1913) opens with an important contribu- 

 tion to our knowledge of the life-history 

 of the Glossy Ibis by Oscar E. Baynard 

 who records no less than twenty-six 

 nests of this rare bird from Florida; an 

 even more extensive study of the nesting 

 habits of a single species is presented by 

 Cordelia J. Standwood who, on pp. 118- 

 137, writes of the Olive-back Thrush in its 

 summer home in Maine. Her paper, like 

 that of Baynard's, is illustrated by some 

 excellent photographs. 



