178 



General Notes. [a?1\\ 



Dryobates scalaris lucasanus in San Diego County, California. — A 

 Sapsucker collected by Mr. W. W. Price on April 29, 18S9, at White 

 Water, San Diego County, Cal., is a typical example of Dryobates 

 scalaris lucasanus. Mr. Price writes me that the specimen (^ ad., No. 

 5,324, collection of G. S. Miller, Jr.) was shot from a telegraph pole "about 

 three miles west of the station of White Water." Woodpeckers, appar- 

 ently of the same kind, were seen on several other occasions on the tele- 

 graph poles along the line of the S. P. R. R. near White Water, but they 

 were very shy and no more could be killed. The birds were nesting in 

 the telegraph poles, there being no other wood in the region. 



Mr. A. W. Anthony found this bird among the San Pedro Martir 

 Mountains, Lower California, in April, 1S93 (Zoe, IV, October, 1893, 

 p. 236). The present record extends the range of the form considerably 

 to the northward. — Gkrrit S. Miller, Jr., Cambridge, Mass. 



Notes on the Capture of the Gray Kingbird (Tyraunus dominicensis) 

 near Charleston, South Carolina. — In the early part of May, 1885, Mr. 

 Brewster and myself saw a pair of Gray Kingbirds at Fort Moultrie, 

 Sullivan's Island, S. C. I determined to secure these birds with their 

 nest and eggs, and after several visits to the Island I located their range, 

 and on May 28, I found their nest which contained one egg and shot the 

 female bird. The nest was built in a silver-leaf poplar, in a gentleman's 

 vard, only a few feet from his dwelling house. The nest, as I remember 

 it, was very frail. Since that date of capture I have failed to notice the 

 presence of this species on any of the coast islands of South Carolina, 

 until this year, 1893. 



On May 30 of this year, I determined to search Sullivan's Island care- 

 fully for this rare visitor, and accordingly I arrived there early in the 

 morning of the above date. After walking the entire length of the 

 Island near the front beach, and having failed to discover this species, I 

 leisurely searched the back beach. At twelve o'clock — mid-day — a bird 

 I saw flying about three hundred yards away I took to be this species. I 

 followed the direction of its flight until it was lost to view — over half a 

 mile away. I at once hastened to the spot, and to my delight found a 

 veritable Gray Kingbird perched on the top of a flag pole about fifty feet 

 high in a private yard. The law on the Island prohibits shooting, under 

 penatly of $10.00 fine. My only chance was for the bird to light on the 

 Government property — Fort Moultrie grounds — six yards away, where I 

 could not be molested. I did not have long to wait before the male 

 which was perched on the flag pole flew into the Government lands 

 where I at once shot it. Upon my shooting the bird its mate flew directly 

 over me, and I soon had it stored carefully away in my collecting basket. 

 The nest which was found in the private yard, close to the flag pole, was 

 built in the top of a small live oak tree about twenty feet high. It is a 

 very frail structure, and is composed of sticks, jesamine vines, and lined 

 apparently with oleander rootlets. One article in its composition which 



