occurs along the open coasts of the Arctic and Bering seas merely 

 as a straggler." Joseph Grinnell, in his essay on the Birds of Kotze- 

 bue Sound, gives an interesting note of his experience with this 

 owl, from which I quote : 



In the spring of 1899 their arrival was noted on April 10th in the Yukon 

 district of Alaska. At this date they were already paired, and a female secured 

 contained large ova. On April 26th I located a pair of hawk owls which by 

 their restlessness indicated a nesting site near by. The nest was finally 

 found, but there were as yet no eggs. It was in the hollow end of a leaning 

 dead spruce stub about 10 feet above the ground. The dry rotten chips in 

 the bottom were modelled into a neatly rounded depression. The male bird 

 was quite noisy often repeating a far-reaching rolling trill. Both birds fre- 

 quently uttered a low whine, alternately answering one another. On May 8th, 

 while snow-shoeing across the country toward the base of the Jade moun- 

 tains, my attention was attracted by the distant trill of a hawk owl. 

 I had given up hope of finding a nest and had started on, when, by mere 

 chance, I happened to catch sight of a hole in a dead spruce fully 200 yards 

 away. A close approach showed a sitting bird which afterwards proved 

 to be the male. Its tail was protruding at least two inches from the hole, 

 while the bird's head was turned so that it was facing out over its back. 

 When I tapped on the tree the bird left the nest, flew off about thirty yards, 

 turned and made for my head like a shot. It planted itself with its full weight 

 on to my skull, drawing blood from three claw-marks in my scalp. My hat 

 was torn off and thrown twelve feet. All this the owl did with scarcely a 

 stop in its headlong swoop. When as far on the other side the courageous 

 bird made another dash and then another, before I had collected enough 

 wits to get in a shot. The female which was evidently the bird I had first 

 discovered on look-out duty then made her appearance, but was less vociferous. 

 The nest contained three newly hatched young and six eggs in various ad- 

 vanced stages of incubation. The downy young, although their eyes were 

 still tightly closed and they were very feeble, uttered a continuous wheedling 

 cry, especially if the tree were tapped or they were in any way jarred. This 

 could be heard twenty feet away from the base of the tree. The nest cavity 

 was evidently an enlarged woodpecker's hole. 



Woodland Species 



The kingfishers, arriving early from the south in large numbers, 

 frequent all the streams of the interior, digging nest-tunnels in their 

 banks, and remaining until the freezing of the rivers compels them to 

 betake themselves to less severe latitudes. 



Both hairy and downy woodpeckers abound, making their nest- 

 holes by preference in the stubs and trunks of deciduous trees, yet 

 occupying spruces whenever birches and poplars are not at hand. 

 Two species of three-toed woodpeckers also breed in these forests, as 

 also does the northern variety of the eastern flicker. Bishop says that 

 these flickers are the most common of all woodpeckers about Fort 

 Yukon. 



Whether the hummingbird of the coast (Selasphorus rufus) ever 

 crosses the mountains into the interior is not certainly known ; no 

 doubt it does so now and then, as it appears to be a regular visitor to 

 the head-valleys of the Yukon River. 



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