296 General Notes. \J$ X 



The Guadalupe Junco {J unco insularis) easily fulfills the above require- 

 ments of a species Indeed as it averages 10 mm. less in length of wing 

 than its nearest relative J. townsendi. and its bill is nearly 2 mm. longer, 

 there is small likelihood even of ordinary intergradation. There are also 

 well-defined color characters. 



In Dr. Dwight's recent paper on the Juncos (Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. 

 Hist., XXXVIII, 1918, p. 269) he has reduced this Junco as well as Junco 

 townsendi to subspecies, on the grounds that their characters are quantita- 

 tive rather than qualitative. But are their peculiarities merely quantitative, 

 and do not the differences exhibited by these forms more nearly approach 

 the characters commonly regarded as of generic value than do the " quali- 

 tative " color differences between the forms regarded by Dr. Dwight as 

 species?- — W. DeW. Miller, American Museum of Natural History, 

 New York City. 



" Off " Flavors of Wildfowl. — Following is an extract from a letter on 

 this subject by Dr. L. C. Jones of Falmouth, Mass., who has been quoted 

 in a previous article 1 on this subject. It will be noted that one of Dr. 

 Jones' theories is much the same as that advanced by the writer in the last 

 sentence of his first communication on fishy flavor. 2 



" I would like to advance a new theory which I think may explain the 

 cause in many cases. I refer to the possibility of " fatigue toxins " in 

 the flesh of birds which have taken long flights and are thin or emaciated 

 and obviously out of condition. The same might hold in those birds which 

 have been shot previously but not wholly disabled. Many of these have 

 intestines agglutinated with peritonitis, local abscesses, or suppurating 

 wounds in the skin or muscles where shot has entered. Unpleasant as it 

 may be to think of this, practically all of these birds reach the market and 

 are undoubtedly eaten, chiefly of course by those who do not dress their 

 own game. 



" The more you consider this explanation, the more points you will 

 find to support it. For instance, I have eaten many ducks in the begin- 

 ning of the season, Redheads, Bluebills and Black Ducks, birds which have 

 just arrived from the north and I think without question that most of them 

 have been comparatively unpalatable. Birds from the same flocks, shot 

 a fortnight or so later, even when the diet has consisted almost entirely ot 

 eelgrass seed from the salt water bays and estuaries, have been plump and 

 delicious. May not fatigue with starvation, or rest with repletion, be the 

 great determining factors in the flavor of migrating fowl? You may readily 

 conceive that in certain instances of excessive fatigue or when the 

 abdominal organs were badly infected, the flesh of such birds might be 

 distinctly poisonous. ..." L. C. Jones, M. D.— W. L. McAtee, U. S. 

 Biological Survey, Washington, D. C. 



■ Auk, Vol. 36, No. 1, Jan., 1919, pp. 101-101. 

 s Auk, Vol. 35, No. 4, Oct., 1918, p. 476. 



