340 General Notes. [** 



In 'The Auk,' XXIV, p. 97, I illustrate my belief that the taking of a 

 bird with the skin of the abdomen thickened and other indication of hav- 

 ing recently bred was not positive proof that it did so in the locality where 

 taken, and in 'The Auk,' XXIV, p. 145, Mr. Taverner considers this an 

 "oblique criticism" of his record of the Savanna Sparrow breeding in St. 

 Clair County ('The Auk,' XXII, p. 89). He is mistaken. I had no 

 means of knowing that he met with the species in considerable numbers 

 together with the above mentioned indications of having bred. It is 

 certain he recorded the species as breeding on no such evidence. Here 

 is his record: "June 18, 1904, near Pearl Beach, St. Clair Co., on the 

 edge of the St. Clair Flats, I found a colony of these birds breeding. About 

 a dozen birds were seen." Not only did he find no nests or young but 

 did not even succeed in collecting an adult bird, according to Mr. Swales. 

 The finding of the species in considerable numbers, etc., were the result 

 of later investigation and have nothing to do with the above record. — 

 J. Claire Wood, Detroit, Michigan. 



Probable Breeding of the Wandering Tatler in the Interior of Alaska. — 



While collecting for the U. S. Biological Survey near the upper MacMillan 

 River, Yukon Territory, I secured an immature example of the Wander- 

 ing Tatler September 5, 1904. It was first observed on some gravel bars 

 near the head of Russell Creek, a small tributary entering the MacMillan 

 from the north near the main forks of the latter. Although apparently a 

 migrating bird, it was so young that it seems probable it was hatched at 

 least somewhere in the interior of northwest America. It was quite able 

 to fly, but the neck and head were still downy. 



Further evidence of the breeding of this species has been obtained re- 

 cently by Charles Sheldon of New York, who spent the summer of 1906 

 in the Alaskan Range and about Mount McKinley, Alaska. Mr. Sheldon 

 sends me the following extract from his notes taken July 28, 190G, while 

 encamped at the foot of Peters Glacier, Mount McKinley: 



"Raining very hard in the morning so we could not pack the horses 

 and start. At 2 p. m., Jack Hayden and I started to climb the ridges and 

 look for my knife which I lost yesterday, evidently while skinning a young 

 marmot. We killed a cony and ground squirrel with the 22-rifle, also a 

 large female marmot. Passing two little lakes buried in the gravel moraine 

 of the Peters Glacier, I saw a pair of sandpipers. They appeared much 

 disturbed. As we went to shoot one, they kept flying about and lighting 

 on willow trees. After repeated shots, Hayden finally killed one. After 

 each shot at the bird as it sat in the tree, it would fly in a short circle and 

 come back and alight on the tree, always near one place. The other kept 

 flying about near. It was clear they had young ones near. A short search 

 failed to reveal them and we had not time to look very long." 



The specimen was preserved and proved to be the Wandering Tatler 

 (Heteractitis incanus). It is now in the collection of Dr. Leonard Sanford 

 of New Haven. — Wilfred H. Osgood, U. S. Biological Survey. 



