THE OOLOGIST 



181 



To the foregoing list must be added 

 the following species which are found 

 more abundant in the upper sections 

 of the valley near Burns. 



House Finches, Yellow Warblers, 

 R. S. Flicker, House Wrens, Magpies, 

 Mourning Doves, Killdeer, Spotted 

 Sandpiper, Bullock's Oriole, Turkey 

 Vulture, Mountain Bluebirds, West 

 Night Hawks, and No. 64 Caspian 

 Terns, the latter nesting far out in 

 Malheur Lake. 



The total number of species ob- 

 served by me during my stay was 74. 

 In my observation, probably the birds 

 most abundant would be in about this 

 order: 



Cinnamon Teal, American Coot, 

 Western Marsh Wren, Avocet, Ring- 

 billed and Cal. Gulls, American-eared 

 Grebes, Black-crowned Night Herons, 

 Forester's and Black Terns, Yellow- 

 headed Blackbirds. 



The least common species nesting: 

 Canada Goose, Trumpeter Swan, Eg- 

 rets, Sandhill Crane, Curlew. 



A comparative estimate of the num- 

 ber of birds breeding on the Malheur 

 Lake reservation and adjacent grounds 

 is 52,700. 



A. G. Prill, 

 Scio, Ore. 



YELLOW RAIL'S EGGS 



"The Rev. P. B. Peabody has been 

 again successful in the taking of a set 

 of Yellow Rail, nine eggs, in North 

 Dakota. They go to B. S. Bowdish. 

 This set is undoubtedly by the same 

 bird whose eggs were taken last year. 

 The eggs are of the same type; save 

 that two of the eggs are faintly 

 specked, all over, with rather warm 

 brown. The nest was of rare beaixty 

 and of small size. It measured four 



inches in lateral diameter; with a depth 

 of two and a half inches. Horse 

 tracks lay in every direction from the 

 nest at a distance of two feet. The 

 covering wisp of dead grass was very 

 scanty. The water depth was four 

 inches. The eggs were ten days in- 

 cubated and required twelve hours for 

 the blowing. Attenuations of caustic 

 were used at very brief intervals." 



(The above item which has been re- 

 fused a place in the columns of one of 

 the more pretentious Bird Magazines, 

 is handed on to Editor Barnes in the 

 hope that he, at least, may not say of 

 it: 'The matter submitted does not ap- 

 pear to me to be of a sort meriting 

 publication in The Oologist.") 



Further items concerning this find 

 are added here: The exquisitely 

 rounded nest was unusually small. 

 Though resting fairly in the water, 

 only a bit of the nest bottom was damp. 

 The eggs were thoroughly concealed 

 by overhanging dead grass. Not a 

 sound of Yellow Rails was heard dur- 

 ing three days of search. This fact 

 may have been due to the advance 

 state of the egg-incubation. 



These eggs could not possibly have 

 been saved without the use of caustic. 

 It is a fair proof that attenuations of 

 caustic potash, cautiously and briefly 

 used, do not weaken the shells of 

 eggs that when the vertebrae of the 

 embryos and the eyes were forced out 

 of the shells, after over ten hours, 

 there followed neither shell-bursting 

 nor shell-chipping. Two of the eggs 

 of this set are of the very rare type 

 which bears a few spots over the en- 

 tire surface, beside the wreath of the 

 apical cap. 



P. B. Peabody. 



We welcome items of this sort, des- 

 cribing rare finds, even though "The 

 Oologist" is not pretentious. — R. M. B. 



