230 University of California Publications in Zoology I Vuh - ln 



"grayer upper parts and thicker bill." We have tested the 

 material at hand as regards these two characters and are abso- 

 lutely unable to distinguish our birds from the San Jacinto 

 Mountains and elsewhere in southern California, from perfectly 

 comparable material as regards age and stage of plumage from 

 various parts of the Sierra Nevada, central as well as southern 

 The Museum's series includes good specimens from extreme 

 southern San Diego County: Campo, .Mountain Spring, Cuya- 

 maca and Volcan mountains. These, also, are in no appreciable 

 way different from plumifera. 



In other words, we see no excuse for using any name other 

 than plumifera for the mountain quail of southern California. 



Lophortyx calif ornica vallicola Ridgwaj 

 Valley Quail 



An abundant species in the San Jacinto Mountains, found 

 at all suitable points from the Lower Sonoran valleys surround- 

 ing the range, up into the lower edge of Transition. Twenty- 

 two specimens were collected, as follows: Snow Creek, three nos. 

 2160-2162) ; Cabezon, five (nos. 1657 1661 ; Banning, four nos. 

 2018 2021 ; Yallevista, three (nos. 3094 3096) : Dos Palmos. two 

 (nos. 2491, 2492) ; and Palm Canon, live i nos. 3046 3050). Other 

 points of record are Vandeventer Plat, Kenworthy, Hemel Lake, 

 Thomas .Mountain. Strawberry Valley, and Schain's Ranch. Mosl 

 of these localities are in Upper Sonoran. the highest points only — 

 Strawberry Valley (6000 feet) and Thomas Mountain (6800 

 feet) — being ;it the lower edge of Transition. 



This quail breeds in greatest abundance on the sage-brush 

 covered floor of the upper Hemel Valley, the region from Hemet 

 Lake to Vandeventer Flat being peculiarly adapted to the species. 

 At Kenworthy. in this valley, they were numerous, and nearly 

 all in pairs at the time of our arrival, May 19. A nesl was found 

 here on May 23 (no. 72), very imperfectly concealed at the base 

 of a scanty clump of sage brush. The slight depression in the 



ground forming the nest was scantily lined with <_:r;i^s and w I 



Stalks; at this date it contained ten fresh eggs. A second nest. 

 containing eight eggs, was found on June 23 in the same localitv, 



