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Distribution and Migration of North 

 American Herons and Their Allies. 

 By Wells W. Cooke. Bulletin No. 

 45, Biological Survey. 70 pp., 21 maps 

 in text. 1913. 



Through an oversight this important 

 publication has not before been noticed 

 in Bird-Lore. It treats of the Ibises, 

 Jabiru, Flamingo and Roseate Spoonbill, 

 as well as the Herons, and includes all the 

 species of these groups found from Panama 

 northward. When any of these birds are 

 found south of Panama their South 

 American as well as North American 

 range is given. 



The ranges of all the species regularly 

 occurring in the limits prescribed are 

 given in great detail, and are graphically 

 illustrated by a series of most instructive 

 maps. The localities from which a species 

 is recorded are entered on the map of its 

 distribution, and the symbols employed 

 readily enable one to determine whether 

 the bird occurs at the point marked, as a 

 breeder, in summer, in winter, etc. 



Comparatively few of the species 

 treated are strictly migratory, those which 

 breed from southern Florida and south- 

 eastern Texas and southward being found 

 as species, throughout the year. There 

 is, however, more or less wandering, and, 

 with some species, a curious northward 

 movement after the breeding season. 



Professor Cooke calls due attention to 

 this post-breeding 'migration' and adds: 

 "A still more remarkable migration habit 

 is that of the Snowy Egret. Numbers of 

 these birds migrate in the spring far north 

 of the breeding range, and remain through- 

 out the summer in these northern dis- 

 tricts as non-breeders." 



This Bulletin takes its place with similar 

 ones prepared by Professor Cooke for 

 the Biological Survey, on the shore-birds. 

 Ducks and Geese, Warblers, etc., and is a 

 mine of information for anyone who would 

 know where and when the birds it deals 

 with may be found. Let us hope that 

 others will soon appear. — F. M. C. 



(I 



Field Note-Book of Birds. By. A. H. 

 Wright and A. A. Allen. Department 

 of Zoology, Cornell University. Includ- 

 ing Outlines for the Recording of 

 Observations, and Sheets for Preserv- 

 ing a Check-List of Birds Seen. For 

 Sale by the Cornell Co-operation. 

 Ithaca, N. Y. Price 50 cents, postage 

 4 cents. 



This field book is intended primarily to 

 receive one's observations on the color, 

 form, actions and notes of strange birds 

 as a means to their identification. Each 

 page of the body of the book is headed by 

 an outline representing a generalized 

 figure of a passerine bird. Woodpecker, 

 Gull, wading-bird, shore-bird. Duck or 

 Hawk. A model sheet explains how these 

 outlines are to be filled in, and also how 

 the remainder of the page may be utilized 

 in recording data on habits, distribution, 

 nest, etc. Tables giving 'The Average 

 Date of Spring Arrivals of Birds at 

 Ithaca' and 'Earliest Nesting Dates for 

 Ithaca,' and ruled pages for a check-list 

 roll-call are added. The whole makes an 

 attractive and practical booklet well 

 designed to aid the field student both in 

 observing and recording.^F. M. C. 



Cassinia: Proceedings, Delaware Val- 

 ley Ornithological Club, XVII, 

 1913. [Issued March, 1914.] pp. 1-68; 

 I plate. 



'Cassinia' for 1913 opens with one of 

 Witmer Stone's always acceptable con- 

 tributions to the literature of biographical 

 ornithology, if this term may be used in 

 contradistinction to ornithological biog- 

 raphy! He writes of Alexander Wilson, 

 and reminds us of the remarkable fact 

 that his "entire ornithological career, from 

 the day he announced his intention of 

 making a collection of 'all our finest 

 birds,' to his premature demise [at the 

 age of forty-seven], covered but ten 

 years!" Mr. Stone speaks especially of a 

 statue of Wilson by Alexander Calder, 

 now in the Academy of Natural Sciences of 

 Philadelphia, and makes the admirable 



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