1913 BIRDS OF THE FRESNO DISTRICT 49 



from an alfalfa patch, near Clovis, and November 25, 1903, another from the 

 same place. November 26, 1906, they were fouiid to be common in a stubble 

 field two miles southeast of Clovis. They were fearless, or perhaps their eyesight 

 was not good, for I was able to approach within ten feet of one without dif- 

 ftculty. There were at least half a dozen individuals and probably many more 

 in the field. 



Mr. Joseph Sloanaker reported this owl as occurring near Raisin during the 

 winter, and in the vicinity of Wheatville and Jameson they are really abundant. 

 One evening in December while concealed in a stubble field near Jameson, I was 

 astonished at the great number of Short-eared Owls. Barn Owls, and Marsh 

 Hawks that appeared just before sundown and began hunting over the fields. 

 The number of doves that were disturbed by these Raptores was almost beyond 

 belief, and the noise made by their wings as they flew wildly about was almost 

 deafening. When I resumed my walk toward camp it seemed a really perilous 

 journey, and there was grave danger of being struck by one of the rapidly flying 

 doves that wheeled and turned, alighted and took wing again in a veritable maze. 

 T estimated that there were at least two hundred Short-eared Owls in sight. They 

 could easily be distinguished from the Barn Owls by the marked resemblance 

 of their flight to that of the Texas Nighthawk. 



April 12. 1902, a man who was plowing in a field near New Hope, flushed a 

 Short-eared Owl from the weeds, and brought to me the three fresh eggs that 

 were lying on a circle of dry grass almost upon the bare ground. 



April 30, 1908, while looking for owls' eggs near the same place, a man told 

 me of driving his horse and cart almost over one of these owls as she sat on her 

 neatly made nest of dry grass and feathers. This was about two weeks before my 

 visit and he said the nest contained "seven or eight white eggs a little smaller 

 than hen's eggs." I have flushed this owl from the ground at quite a number 

 of places on the west side of the valley during April, but never found a nest. 



Southern Spotted Owl. Strix occidentalis occidentalis (Xantus). 



The occurrence of this owl in Fresno County is known to the author only 

 through the observation of a single individual seen March 7, 1908. This was in 

 a small grove of cottonwoods near Letcher, in the foothills about twenty-six 

 miles northeast of Fresno and a little outside the district treated in this list. As 

 it is a definite record for this general region it seemed not out of place to meti- 

 tion it here. 



While I can give no other record of the presence of this owl, yet for certain 

 reasons, I feel convinced that systematic work in the foothills along the western 

 base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in this county would prove that the species 

 is not quite as rare as one would be led to believe from the scant information 

 that can be gathered locally concerning it. 



A more complete account of the record referred to above can be found in 

 The Condor, xi, 1909, page 82. 



California Screech Owl. Otus asio bendirei (Brewster). 



Of all the birds the author has ever encountered this one seems to be, by 

 far. the most difiicult to study, and after ten consecutive years of observation in 

 the Fresno district any attempt to state whether or not this little owl is of common 



