46 Williams, Birds of Goose Creek, Fla. [| a u n k 



shallow water of the Gulf of Mexico, lying immediately east of 

 Goose Creek and about eight miles west of the St. Marks Light 

 House and twenty-five miles southwest of Tallahassee. There 

 are not more than seven houses at the place, all temporary lodg- 

 ings for a few persons who go there intermittently to hunt or fish. 

 The family of Lieut. Ludlow Griscom owns one of these houses. 

 The place is the base for the operations of a few mullet fishermen 

 who sell their catches largely to persons from southern Georgia 

 and sections of Florida accessible thereto, who, in turn, go there 

 in wagons from time to time in the fall and winter, to lay in a 

 supply of fish for personal use. 



Goose Creek is a narrow neck of shallow water cutting into the 

 land for a distance of about two miles, in which are numerous oyster 

 Ix'ds, mud fiats, and small bulrush-covered islets, all exposed at 

 low tide, thereby furnishing capital feeding grounds for Ducks, 

 Shore-birds, Herons, and Gulls. On each side of the Creek vast 

 marshes, thickly covered by bulrushes, extend for goodly dis- 

 tances to the heavily timbered lands and more or less sterile prairies 

 of the region. Along the sandy shore in front of East Goose Creek 

 there is a narrow ridge of slight elevation upon which there were 

 glowing a few scraggly bushes, never more than eight feet high, 

 of Ilex vomitoria, Iva frutescens, and Lycium carolinianum, the last 

 bearing a delicate, pretty little blue flower during my visit. In 

 these bushes I found a few Ruby-crowned Kinglets, a Blue-headed 

 Vireo, and numbers of Palm Warblers. The bulrush marshes 

 were ornithologically characterized by Scott's Seaside and Nelson's 

 Sharp-tailed Sparrows, Prairie Marsh Wrens, and Florida Clapper 

 Rails, of which there were goodly numbers. The Sparrows and 

 Wrens kept themselves well hidden down in the dense rushes and 

 rarely appeared to view except when startled by my unexpected 

 approach or to answer my squeaking call. The Rails were 

 seldom seen; indeed, I saw only two; but their loud cries were 

 heard on every side toward dark and at early morning. From their 

 abundance and the unwariness of the two individuals seen, I am 

 pleased to believe that these birds are not in much requisition for 

 sport or food at East Goose Creek. 



Just off the road, in what I call the prairie, about half a mile 

 back toward the woodlands, is a small, shallow, muddy pond, 



