1916 ] General Notes. 439 



March 29 about two weeks after the first spring migrants were seen. Large 

 flocks of migrating robins were still about by April 16. This note is re- 

 corded in the belief that it furnishes some evidence that the first arrivals 

 among the spring migrants are the summer residents and the late migrants 

 those bound for more northern localities. Norman deW. Betts, Madison, 

 Wis. 



Birds with Accessory Wings. — The recent interesting article on " A 

 Four-winged Wild Duck " (Auk, October, 1915) caused the undersigned to 

 search for some references on this deformity, references he remembered 

 having read many years ago, and he recently found them in J. Bland- 

 Sutton's 'Evolution and Disease' (1890), in which work is given an illustra- 

 tion of a Dove with an accessory wing, together with several other exam- 

 ples of dicotomy in other animals. This note is published in order that 

 future workers in avian pathology may not overlook this valuable article 

 of Sutton's. — W. H. Bergtold, Denver, Colo. 



Pseudo-masculinity in Birds. — The undersigned recently secured a 

 Spurred Towhee (Pipilo maculatus montanus) which is of more than 

 ordinary interest. The skin is in the plumage of a male, though the black 

 of the head and throat has a faint brownish cast by reflected light. The 

 bird proved, however, on dissection, to be a female, with a normal ovary, 

 containing ova in various stages of development. It has been held by 

 various writers (vide, Sutton, ' Evolution and Disease ') that, with 

 dimorphic species (dimorphism between the sexes) the assumption of the 

 male dress by the female bird, is always accompanied by an atrophic or, 

 otherwise, diseased condition of the ovary. If this be true the case now 

 reported is an exception, unless this rule does not apply to all birds, but 

 only to the domestic hen, and to pheasants, in which species, Sutton 

 clearly detected this relation between the diseased ovary, and pseudo- 

 masculinity. The undersigned does not know how much is to be found on 

 this question in general ornithologic literature. Sutton cites the following 

 species as exhibiting pseudo-masculinity; — " Pheasants (Common, 

 Golden, and Silver), Domestic Hen, Pea-fowl, Partridge, Bustard, Ameri- 

 can Pelican, Wild and > Domestic Duckg, Cuckoo, Cotinga or Bellbird, 

 Bunting, and Chaffinch," but does not state whether or not diseased 

 ovaries were found in all these cases. — W. H. Bergtold, Denver, Colo. 



