SPREAD OF THE CATTLE EGRET — SPRUNT 265 



•WKST INDIES 



(Since the manuscript of this paper was originally written, cattle 

 egrets have appeared in Cuba and the Virgin Islands.) 



NORTH AMERICA 



As far as I can ascertain, the first sight record of the cattle egret 

 in North America should be credited to Willard E. Dilley, then of 

 Clewiston, Fla., now on the staff of the Everglades National Park. 

 Though the writer made this statement in his article in Audubon 

 Magazine (July-August 1953), the date of Dilley's observation there 

 given is erroneous. It was stated to be May 1948, liecent corre- 

 spondence with Dilley has provided the following information. Under 

 date of May 26, 1954, he writes in reply to my request : 



My wife and I moved to Clewiston in January of 1941. I entered the service of 

 the United States Navy during the summer of 1943, so the occurrence was some- 

 wliere during tliis period. From memory I would place it as the summer of 1941, 

 but it could have been the summer of 1942. 



There were two birds present ; one, a full-plumed bird . . . the other showing 

 just a trace of rust on the head. They were in a marshy pasture which lies 

 between the sandy ridge of Clewiston and the government dyke. They remained 

 in this area for a week. 



Dilley did not record the observation, as he considered the birds 

 escapees. There is every reason to believe now that the ones he saw 

 were among the first to appear in the United States. The exact time 

 and place of the original appearance will probably never be accurately 

 known, as the birds were very likely overlooked for some time. Cer- 

 tainly there is now evidence that practically proves that they were 

 in Florida for some time before coming to the attention of ornitholo- 

 gists. An illustration of this is provided in a recent letter to the writer 

 from Samuel A. Grimes, of Jacksonville, Fla., who has taken a great 

 interest in the species. On a population survey of the cattle egret in 

 May 1954, he talked to a man living near Belle Glade (south shore of 

 Lake Okeechobee) who told him that he had seen cattle egrets feeding 

 "regularly with cattle for two or three years up to the time of the 

 flood (hurricane) in 1949." This would place birds there in 1946 

 or 1947. 



The gap between Dilley's Clewiston birds (1941 or 1942) and the 

 Belle Glade observations is unexplained, as well as the interim suc- 

 ceeding and lasting until the summer of 1951 when the species ap- 

 peared at Cape May, N. J. This was a single specimen, and where it 

 came from and how it succeeded in reaching New Jersey without being 

 reported en route are mysteries. 



1952. — It was in the year 1952 that the cattle egret really came into 

 prominence and produced the sensation now current. And yet, with 

 what is now known, the species had in all probability been present in 

 this country for a decade I That seems incredible, but the facts, being 



