OQO Getieral Notes. Lju'y 



as minute an examination as if he were in my hand. I was more than 

 astonished to find here close to the pavements of a great city the repre- 

 sentative of a race which always loved the wild woods and which I 

 thought had passed away from Illinois forever." 



Mr. R. W. Stafford of Chicago, 111., who has shot hundreds of Pigeons 

 in former years within the present city limits of Chicago, informs me 

 that in the latter part of September, 1894, while shooting at Marengo, 111., 

 he saw a flock of six flying swiftly over and apparently alight in a small 

 grove some distance off. 



The above records will show that while in this section of country large 

 flocks of Passenger Pigeons are a thing of the past, yet they are still 

 occasionally observed in small detachments or single birds. — Ruthven 

 Deane, Chicago, III- 



Ospreys at Bristol, R. I. — All along the shores of Mount Hope Bay on 

 the promontory of Bristol, Rhode Island, the Osprey breeds in com- 

 paratively large numbers. Although the surrounding country is geologi- 

 cally the same in character yet only few nests are to be found elsewhere. 

 The island of Rhode Island itself, I believe, has a few nests on its shores 

 and near Wickford and along the Providence River a half dozen or so 

 scattered pairs breed. 



But there is in Bristol proper each summer, a colony, if so it can be 

 called, consisting of fifteen pairs. Seven of the nests are in dead button- 

 wood trees {Platanus occidentalis) and the remaining eight are built on 

 a kind of structure erected by the farmers for their convenience; namely, 

 a stout pole, averaging twenty-five feet in height, on the top of which an 

 old cart wheel has been placed. In some instances a crossbar forming a 

 perch is nailed just below or on the upper side of the wheel. 



After a new pole has been raised, wiiich is generally in the autumn, 

 the coming spring sees it taken by a pair of Hawks. The farmers claim 

 that the birds arrive regularly on the tenth of April, that is at the depart- 

 ure of the Gulls northward. They immediately commence repairing the 

 damage done to their home during the past winter. At this time they 

 can be seen flying about with long streamers of eel-grass trailing from 

 their talons. P'rom yearly additions the nests reach enormous dimen- 

 sions and between the spokes of the wheels and among the heavy sticks 

 that form the base, English Sparrows (Passer domesticus) build. About 

 the first week in May the females lay three eggs (very rarely four) and 

 by the last of the month or in the first week in June the fluffy bodies 

 of the young can be seen above the edge of the nest. By the middle of 

 August they are able to care for themselves. 



In one of the pole nests in the summer of 1S90 the birds had, either in 

 repairing it or in some other way, brought a bulb or seed of a weed to 

 the nest w-here, cultivated by the decayed fish, it grew to the height of 

 two or three feet. They paid no attention to it and in the course of a 

 few weeks it withered and died. 



