BIRDS OF THE CAMBRIDGE REGION. log 



97. Cryptoglaux tengmalmi richardsoni (Bonap.). 

 Richardson's Owl. 



Exceedingly rare winter visitor. 



On December 26, 1902, a Richardson's Owl was taken in a birch swamp 

 near ArHngton Heights by a boy of about fifteen years of age, named Walter 

 Crosby, who discovered it perched on a branch of a small birch about six feet 

 above the ground. He began throwing stones at it, when it made a succession 

 of short flights, keeping, however, to the swamp and within one hundred yards 

 or less of the spot where it was first seen. At length it was struck by a stone 

 and killed. Although ignorant at the time of the local rarity of his prize, young 

 Crosby decided to have it mounted, and took it that same evening to Mr. Wil- 

 liam P. Hadley who, on skinning it, found it to be a male " in good condition, 

 although the stomach was almost perfectly empty." I am indebted to Mr. 

 Hadley for the above particulars as well as for the bird itself which he has been 

 kind enough to purchase for me from the Crosby family. It is a beautiful spec- 

 imen in exceptionally fresh, richly colored plumage. 



An Owl killed in Mount Auburn in 1865, and preserved in my collection 

 for a number of years, was identified and recorded^ by Mr. Maynard in 1870 as 

 a Richardson's Owl. This bird is no longer in existence, but I can vouch for 

 the fact that it was really a Saw-whet, in full and perfectly normal winter 

 plumage. Although not responsible for the original publication of this error, I 

 am certainly blameworthy for having" allowed it to stand so long uncorrected. 



Richardson's Owl has been taken in Newton (on February 26, 1879^), as 

 well as at Framingham, West Dedham, Maiden, Lynn, and a few other localities 

 in eastern Massachusetts. Its visits to our State are rare and infrequent, how- 

 ever, and it is not often seen in northern New England. Perhaps it is less 

 given to southward migrations than are most of the Owls which share its wide 

 boreal range, or it may be one of the least numerously represented among them. 

 The latter view is held by Mr. E. A. Preble who tells me that he has seldom met 

 with it during his extended travels in British North America. According to 

 Major Bendire, however, "it appears to be very common about Great Slave Lake, 

 specimens having been received from all the different Hudson Bay Company 



1 C. J. Maynard, Naturalist's Guide, 1870, 133. 



2T. M. Brewer, Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History, XX, 1879, 272. No. 867, 

 collection of E. A. and O. Bangs. 



