Vol XVIII 

 190 



1 Tenth Supplement to the A. O. U. Check-List. 295 



TENTH SUPPLEMENT TO THE AMERICAN ORNITH- 

 OLOGISTS' UNION CHECK-LIST OF 

 NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 



The Ninth Supplement to the A. O. U. Check-List was pub- 

 lished in January, 1899 (Auk, XVI, pp. 97-133). The present 

 Supplement gives a report of the action of the Committee on 

 questions affecting the Check-List" that have arisen during the 

 period from January, 1899 ^° April, 1901, and on many of the 

 cases deferred for final action at the 1899 meeting of the Com- 

 mittee. 



Owing to lack of material, it was found necessary to defer final 

 action on many questions, as shown in the subjoined list of de- 

 ferred cases. All questions affecting the status of genera and 

 subgenera were also deferred. While the Committee has raised, 

 in previous Supplements, a number of the groups recognized orig- 

 inally as subgenera in the Check-List to the rank of genera, and 

 is of the opinion that still others should be thus raised, it seemed 

 better to defer this phase of the subject till the whole matter can 

 be taken up in its entirety. 



As the loth edition of Linneeus's ' Systema Naturae' is adopted 

 as the starting point of binomial nomenclature, it is not considered 

 necessary to notice the many discrepancies due to the adoption of 

 the 12th edition of this work as the starting point, as in Sharpe's 

 ' Hand-List of Birds ' (Vols. I and II) and elsewhere, nor to con- 

 sider cases already settled by the Committee after careful consid 

 eration, unless new evidence is brought forward adverse to the 

 Committee's ruling. 



The members of the Committee present at the session were 

 Allen, Brewster, Merriam and Ridgway ; the session was held in 

 Washington, April 10-18, 1901. Much of the work of the Com- 

 mittee, however, had been previously apportioned among the 

 members, so that nearly all the questions of nomenclature and the 

 status of many of the recently described species and subspecies 

 had been carefully investigated by different members of the 

 Committee in advance of the session. 



As in the previous Supplements, the numbers at the left of the 



