84 



THE OOLOGIST. 



not help glauciug at the head, (see cut 

 I). Notice the eye, position, size, &c.; 

 compare with other Ijii-cls; notice upper 

 and lower eyelid; find the third lid; no- 

 tice live bird wink; the beak\ shape, 

 size, color; nostrils; open mouth and 

 probe to find their opening into mouth: 

 nostrils open beneath a soft tumid cere; 

 compare with bills of other birds; find 

 the auditory aperature; compai'e with 

 other birds; has size and shape any- 

 thing to do with acuteness of hearing? 

 make a careful drawing of head. *The 

 specimen should 'be killed with chloi'O- 

 fonn or ether. If put in a large glass 

 jar with chloroformed sponge, note 

 which way it falls when being over- 

 come by the drug. Laying specimen 

 on boai'd, draw outline of bird; dip in 

 hot water and pluck; draw another out- 

 line of body; compare with first; notice 

 feather tras, &c., &c.\ thrust blow- 

 pipe (one without enlargement of end) 

 in the mouth: loop a string around the 

 beak behind sere,tighteuing it enough to 

 prevent air escaping while the crop and 

 air sacs are inflated; withdraw the 

 blow-pipe, at the same instant tighten- 

 ing the loop to prevent escape of air; tie 

 securely; make an incision through skin 

 along keel of stei'num back to vent and 

 forward to throat. Skin the whole ven- 

 tral surface of the body; (being careful 

 not to cut the crop) the oesophagtis, trace 

 it from mouth to crop; lobes of crop; 

 fine lines, muscle fibres in walls of crop; 

 jugular veins on each side of neck; 

 trachea; rings of same; are they com- 

 plete rings? do not forget drawing pa- 

 per; large muscle of Ijreast; muscles of 

 abdomen; make an abdominal incision 

 from sternum to vent; be careful not to 

 cut the abdominal air-sacs; part the ab- 

 dominal walls and note the air-sacs; 

 find an(ither pair of air-sacs anterior to 

 these; remove the ligature around man- 

 dibles; break the humerus bone of one 

 wing, after clearing it of flesh; insert 



♦The bird should have fasted a day or two be- 

 fore being killed. 



the broken body-end of bone in water; 

 inflate air-sacs as before; what does this 

 show? What are you doing with your 

 note-book? the membrane which cover- 

 ed the contents of abdomen is the great 

 omentum; make incisions on each side 

 of keel of breast-bone; dissect away 

 breast muscles, noting their structure, 

 &c., with strong scissors make an in- 

 cision through the sternum parallel to 

 the keel; inflate the air-sacs at first; 

 part the pieces of breast- bone; can anj' 

 more air-sacs be seen? make another 

 incision of sternum similar to first on 

 other side; remove keel of sternum; 

 note the position &c. of the following 

 organs, viz: — Liver, gizzard, heart, 

 lungs, intestines, &c., ti*ace the diges- 

 tive canal from crop to gizzard; back- 

 ward from gizzard, the part of intestine 

 nearest it is the duodenum — its loop 

 shape; prt?zr';-eas in loop; trace intes- 

 tine backward; the mesentery, the thin 

 membrane holding intestine; trace the 

 intestine to the two bulb-like protub- 

 erences, the caeca; (cut IX-n.) back of 

 these the digestive canal is know as the 

 large intestine; the widening of the 

 large intestine near the vent is the clo- 

 aca. The liver; lobes; the bile duels 

 leaving the right lobe; where do they 

 empty? notice ducts leading from pan- 

 creas. The part of the canal for a 

 short distance in front of gizzard in the 

 provenlriculus. 

 {To be contimied in the March number .'\ 



Bro' Partridge- 



Hudson is a town of about 800 inhab- 

 itants. In September 1889, I saw a 

 Ruffed Grouse in the garden upon an 

 apple tree over i-nn by a Concord grape 

 vine. Every day or two for a month I 

 saw him there. He staid in town all 

 winter, in April he disai^peared. In 

 fall of 181)0. he was on hand again, and 

 during that winter spent three weeks 

 of the sevei'est weather in a large Nor- 

 way spruce within twenty-five feet of my 



