2o8 General Notes. [j* u r k 



Porzana noveboracensis. Ten years ago, in a certain piece of wet 

 meadow land near Springfield, I captured a Yellow Rail. This was the 

 first and only one that to my knowledge had been observed in this part of 

 the State. One day in the autumn of 1901, at the same place, I found four 

 of this species, and there, later that season and each of the three following 

 autumns, I found others. So little has been known, or at least written, 

 about the Yellow Rail, that I took particular pains to observe them. The 

 place where they were found was wet meadow land covered with wild 

 grass, which in October stood, in places where it had not been harvested; 

 to the height of two or three feet and harbored many Virginia Rails and 

 Soras. The grass upon the other part of the land was cut in the summer, 

 and by the middle of October the second growth reached the height of 

 seven or eight inches, and in this portion the Yellow Rails are to be 

 found, they apparently not desiring so thick a cover as do the common 

 kinds. When the bird is in the air the white spots on the wings make 

 the identification an easy matter. Its flight is much like that of the Sora, 

 although it is apt to rise higher. On alighting it usually immediately 

 secretes itself, but not always, as 1 have seen it on such occasions run with 

 great rapidity. I have flushed all by the aid of a dog, except one, and 

 that rose about twenty feet ahead of me, evidently frightened by my 

 approach. The earliest date in any autumn that I have found them was 

 the 17th of September, and I think that the latest was the 22d of October. 

 In this part of the Connecticut Valley I have been in many meadows of 

 the same character as the one in question, accompanied by a dog educated 

 in such a way that the scent given out by any kind of rail would so 

 attract his attention that he would be likely to make known the presence 

 of such a bird, if any were there, but in these places I have never found a 

 Yellow Rail, and it seems worthy of note that this species should be a 

 regular autumn visitor to a certain piece of meadow land, containing per- 

 haps three acres, and to be found nowhere else in this vicinity at any 

 time. — Robert O. Morris, Springfield, Mass. 



Shore Birds Eating small Fish. — In ' The Auk ' for January, 1S98 (Vol. 

 XV, p. 51), Mr. H. D. Kirkover records an instance of the Greater Yellow- 

 legs feeding on minnows about an inch and a half in length. While on 

 the island of St. Vincent, West Indies, last October, I observed a number 

 of our shore birds feeding on the young of a small fish known as the 

 ' tri tri' (Sicydium plumieri), which were at that time ascending the 

 Richmond River, near which I was staying, by thousands. The land 

 about the lower reaches of this river was laid completely bare by the 

 recent eruptions of the Soufriere, and in its present state proves very 

 attractive to all the species of shore birds which visit the island during 

 the migrations. Those observed or proved by dissection to be eating the 

 young tri tri (which were at that time from half an inch to an inch and 

 a quarter long) were Golden Plover {Charadrius dotninicus), Turnstones 

 (Arenciria tnterpres), Willets (Syjnphemia semipalmata), Pika, or Greater 



