^"iSoS^l Merriam, a Ne-iv Oxvl from Pitgct Sound. IQ 



the descriptions of P. bulleri., but as none were taken it would be 

 unsafe to venture an opinion as to its identity. The second 

 species was seen again about San Benedicte and Socorro Islands 

 where it was nesting. It proved to be Puffinus ciineatus Salvin, 

 heretofore known only from the Bonin Islands south of Japan, 

 Krusenstern Island, and the Hawaiian Islands. 



On July 23, a Red-tailed Tropic Bird, Phaethon rubricaiidus, was 

 shot a short distance north of Guadalupe Island, thus adding the 

 third species of the genus to our fauna. The Red-tailed Tropic 

 Bird has, I think, heretofore been known only from the South 

 Pacific. Whether it is of regular occurrence in our southwestern 

 waters will be ascertained when we have a better knowledge of 

 the pelagic species of this little known region. 



SYRNIUM OCCIDENTALE CAURINUM, A NEW 

 OWL FROM THE PUGET SOUND REGION. 



BY C. HART MERRIAM. 



In the last edition of the Check- List of the American Orni- 

 thologists' Union (1895), and the second edition of Ridgway's 

 'Manual of North American Birds' (1896), California is given as 

 the northern limit of range of the Spotted Owl, Syrnium occidejitale. 

 But in ' The Auk ' for January, 1893 (Vol. X, pp. 17-18) , Mr. S. N. 

 Rhoads records two specimens from twelve miles east of Tacoma 

 — a locality, by the way, some miles distant from the alleged 

 '' western foothills of the Cascades." The only other Puget Sound 

 specimen of which I have any knowledge was killed in the city 

 •of Seattle a year or two ago, and was obtained by Mr. Henry W. 

 Hindshaw, who mounted it for the Museum of the University of 

 Washington, where it was recently examined by Dr. A. K. Fisher 

 and myself. 



On June 22 of the present year (1897), one of my assistants, 

 Mr. E. k. Preble, killed an adult female at Mt. Vernon, in Skagit 



