2l8 Breninger, Sa» Clemente Islarid Birds. lA ril 



SAN CLEMENTE ISLAND AND ITS BIRDS. 



BY GEORGE F. BRENINGER. 



San Clemente Island lies fifty miles to the south from San 

 Pedro, California, well out on the broad bosom of the Pacific, 

 Midway is Catalina Island, that noted summer resort; and to the 

 west, seventy-five miles from San Pedro, is San Nicholas. These 

 islands, though distant by at least one hundred miles from Santa 

 Cruz, Santa Rosa, and San Miguel Islands, are known collectively 

 as the Santa Barbara group. It is but reasonable that they bear 

 considerable affinity one with another in their flora and fauna, and 

 while this is true in a way, there are instances quite to the con- 

 trary. 



Geologically speaking these islands are the exposed tops of 

 mountains, a sunken chain that ran parallel with the Coast Range. 

 San Clemente Island, of which this paper treats, has an altitude 

 of nearly 3000 feet, and a length of twenty-three miles by five 

 miles wide. Frost is unknown, and in consequence vegetation 

 grows rank most of the year. 



Early in February of the present year (1903) I was instructed by 

 the curator of the ornithological department of the Field Columbian 

 Museum to make a collection of the birds on San Clemente and 

 visit the other islands if possible. In accordance therewith I 

 secured passage on a 33-foot gasoline schooner that made period- 

 ical trips to the island in quest of fish. 



The length of my stay was guaged accordingly. On the island 

 accommodations were secured with the man in charge of the San 

 Clemente Wool Company's sheep. This man and his wife are the 

 only inhabitants of the island, apart from a Chinese camp whose 

 occupants remain on the island only during certain periods of 

 fishing. The island is one of great interest alike to the ornitholo- 

 gist, botanist, and student of pre-historic man. 



I found the rocky, surf-beaten shore tenanted by thousands of 

 Black-bellied Plovers {Sguatarola squatarola) in winter dress, and 

 Black Turnstones {Arenaria melanocephald). A number of each 

 were taken but proved so excessively fat that it was thought best 

 to use the limited time on better material. The gulls found about 



