18S7. Goss, Additions to the Birds of Kansas. g 



ragged-edged splashes and dots of dark or blackish brown. (See 

 Auk, III, 1SS6, p. 409.) 



Colinus virginianus texanus (Lawr.). Texan Bob-white. 

 — This bird is entered in the A. O. U. 'Check-List' as "Hab. 

 Southern and Western Texas, north to Western Kansas." On 

 receipt of the 'List', I wrote to Mr. Robert Ridgway, a member 

 of the committee that prepared the list, to know when and where 

 in the western part of the State the birds had been taken. In 

 reply he says: k ' Colinus virginianus texanus, as a bird of 

 Kansas, rests on two specimens, adult females, in the National 

 Museum, labelled, respectively, No. 34425, Republican Fork, 

 May 27, 1S64, Dr. Elliott Coues, U. S. A. ; and No. 34425, same 

 locality, date, and collector. (See Hist, N. Am. B., Ill, p. 474.) 

 These specimens agree exactly with typical examples of texamis 

 as compared with virginianus proper." Since the early settle- 

 ment of the State I have known through report of military men 

 and hunters that Bob-whites were occasionally seen on the Cim- 

 arron River. I never met with them there, and had taken it for 

 granted that they were C. virginianus ; but as the birds were 

 found in Western Kansas long before our Bob-whites, in follow- 

 ing up the settlements, reached the central portion of the State, 

 I am now inclined to think further examination may prove the 

 western bird of the plains to be variety texanus, and that they 

 reached that portion of the country by following north on the old 

 military trails. I have written to several persons in that region 

 for specimens, but as yet have no reply. 



Empidonax pusillus traillii (Azid.). Traill's Fly- 

 catcher. — Mr. George F. Brenninger, Beattie, Marshall Coun- 

 ty, has kindly sent me for examination a nest containing three 

 eggs, taken July 17, 18S6, in a thick second growth of timber, 

 on the bank of a small creek at Beattie, and writes that he found 

 in the same vicinity quite a number of nests. The earliest found, 

 with a full set of eggs, was June 14. In the Goss Ornithological 

 Collection is a female which I shot at Neosho Falls, July 26, 

 1S81, and I have occasionally noticed the birds during th$ sum- 

 mer months, and have no doubt but they will prove to be quite a 

 common summer resident. I congratulate Mr. Brenninger on 

 the find, and thank him for calling my attention to it. The nests 

 are usually placed in upright forks of the small limbs of trees and 

 bushes, from four to ten feet from the ground. A rather deejD 



