^"'il'if ""] (General Notes. 241 



seems to come by way of the steel-trap, when the species becomes too 

 famihar in the farmers' poultry yards. When skins are desired a good 

 method of killing the trapped owls employed by two young farmers is that 

 of smothering the birds in the oat-bin. — Althea R. Sherman, National, 

 Iowa. 



Status of the Picidse in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. — Person- 

 ally, I have, to the date of writing, found five forms of Woodpecker in the 

 Lower Rio Grande Valley, within the limits of Cameron county, they are: 



1. Dryobates scalaris symplectiis. Abundant resident. 



2. Sphyrapicus varius varius. Common migrant and occasional 

 winter sojourner. 



3. Centurus aurifrons. Abundant resident. 



4. Colaptes auratus luteus. Fall and winter visitant. 



5. Colaptes cafer collaris. One record, cf Jan. 8, 1912, collected by 

 myself, and now in collection of Dr. J. Dwight, Jr. 



Possibly Melanerpes erythrocephalus occurs as a winter straggler, 

 though I have not yet found it. 



Indications point to the presence of another Woodpecker, as yet un- 

 recorded by ornithologists. It is known to a number of the native 

 Mexican hunters, who designate it as " carpentera grande"; and describe 

 it as much over a foot in length; black, with scarlet crest: generally 

 occurring during the warm season, and confined to the heaviest growth 

 bordering the river. Totally absent some years. The season of occur- 

 rence would at once eliminate the possibility of it being Asyndesmus levisi; 

 and the only other Woodpecker that seems to fit, even in fair degree, the 

 description and conditions is Phlceotomus scapularis. This Mexican species 

 ranges well up into the state of Tamaulipas, so it might furnish us stragglers 

 now and then, as in the case with Amizilis tzacatl, Ceryle lorquata, Trogon 

 amligiius, etc. — Austin Paul Smith, Brownsville, Texas. 



Differences due to Sex in the Black Swift. — In the treatment ac- 

 corded Nepha;cetes niger borealis by Ridgway in the volume last published 

 of his " Birds of North and Middle America " (vol. 5, 1911, pp. 703, 707), 

 the sexes are declared to be different in markings, the adult male uni- 

 formly sooty underneath, the adult female with the feathers of the poste- 

 rior underparts always more or less distinctly tipped with whitish. A 

 different conclusion had been arrived at by Mr. Frank M. Drew (Bull. 

 Nutt. Orn. Club, VII, 1882, 182, 183), who declared that the fully mature 

 female was indistinguishable in color from the male, fouryears being assumed 

 to be the length of time required to attain this plumage. Mr. Ridgway cites 

 Drew's plumage description in full, with the following comment: "Mr. 

 Drew is undoubtedly mistaken, however, in assuming that the sexes are 

 alike in coloration, for all the sexed specimens examined by me from what- 

 ever locality, show that all those with white-tipped feathers on posterior 

 underparts are females and all those without these white-tipped feathers 



