NATURE 



[March 13, igi_ 



formation in respect to England, which is summarised 

 by Mr. M. Yaughan in the March number of British 

 Birds. As the result of the inquiry it seems practic- 

 ally certain that a decrease — and this not merely local 

 ■ — has taken place in the case of several species, 

 notably the whitethroat, the redstart, the marten, the 

 swallow, and the wryneck. No attempt is made to 

 explain the diminution in numbers, which we have 

 heard attributed, at least in the case of some species, 

 to shooting and netting on the Continent. 



In the February number of The Zoologist Mr. J. M. 

 Dewar records further observations on the manner in 

 which oyster-catchers open mussels and other bivalves. 

 Mussels seldom open their shells wide enough to 

 enable the bird to introduce its beak, except by the 

 way of the gap for the byssus, and when this is not 

 accessible, the oyster-catcher resorts to careful tap- 

 ping, which causes the mollusc to rotate one valve 

 on the other, and thus afford an entrance for the 

 beak. Small mussels are frequently hammered to 

 pieces by repeated blows with the beak. 



Nos. 6 and 7 of The Austral Avian Record are 

 devoted to a list of the species of Australian birds 

 named by John Gould, and the present location of the 

 type specimens, drawn up by Messrs. Witmer Stone 

 and Mathews. The Gould Australian collection was 

 sold in 1847 t0 Dr. T. B. (not J., as has been stated) 

 Wilson, of Philadelphia. The type specimens are for 

 the most part in the museum of the Philadelphia 

 Academy ; although the greater part of those of 

 species named by Gould subsequently to the 1847 sale 

 are in the British Museum. Gould named 426 or 427 

 Australian birds (both numbers are given at the end 

 of the list) of which 341 stand, either as species or 

 subspecies. The list will be valuable to systematic 

 ornithologists. 



In his presidential address to the Royal Australasian 

 Ornithologists' Union, as reported in The Emu of 

 January, Mr. J. M. Mellor emphasised the necessity 

 of continued bird protection and the working of the 

 present Act. A serious defect in this is the oppor- 

 tunity afforded by merely partial protection for a 

 heavy destruction of certain species during the Christ- 

 mas holidays. 



In Science of February 27, Dr. R. W. Shufeldt 

 announces a forthcoming memoir on the Pleistocene 

 avifauna of the Oregon desert, in which three extinct 

 species will be described. . R. L. 



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