THE OOLOGIST 



139 



circle nearly diametrically and caught 

 the unlucky spindle amidships. 



Kingbirds do not confine their efforts 

 to air captures, but often plunge at a 

 grasshopper on the ground. They also 

 eat bees and are known as Bee Martins. 

 I once observed a Great-crested Fly- 

 catcher eating a hornet, which it had 

 captured from the neighborhood of a 

 paper hornet's nest in the woods. Still 

 1 do not think that many bees are 

 caught from the hives of the domestic 

 bees. 



It is not uncommon for the Barn-yard 

 Phoebe to feed from the ground, while I 

 have seen one perch for a moment on 

 the back of a sheep, which caused me 

 to think that this bird ate the ticks after 

 the manner of the Cowbird. All the Fly- 

 catchers are our friends and should be 

 protected. 



The Titlark and Horned Lark feed 

 from the ground and though they are 

 very fair fliers and indulge in many var- 

 iations in flight at times, still they are 

 ground feeders and do not show off in 

 the capture of their prey. The Crows 

 are very prosaic in the capture of their 

 prey, which in the nature of insects 

 mainly consists of grasshoppers, which 

 are caught upon the ground. Bobolinks 

 and all Blackbirds feed upon ground 

 insects and seed mainly, and like most 

 of the singers are not interesting nor 

 dashing in the capture of their food. 

 Among the Sparrows we have few ex- 

 ponents of the art of capturing food on 

 the wing. I have seen the Chipping 

 Sparrow seize a small moth while flying 

 and have observed the same proceeding 

 in the case of a few others of the family, 

 but all of our Sparrows are surpassed 

 in insect capture by that interloper, the 

 European House Sparrow, which is a 

 most persistent feeder upon insects at 

 certain seasons and which it catches on 

 the wing at times with considerable 

 skill. 



MOEKIS GiBBS, M. D. 



(To be Continued.) 



Jottings. 

 On May 7th Mr. John Rittenberg se- 

 cured a male specimen of the Cape May 

 Warbler, Dendroica tigrina, and 

 brought the same to our office, where it 

 still remains, for identification. This 

 species is a very rare migrant in Orleans 

 County. 



W. Raine of Toronto spent the past 

 c ollecting season in Assinaboia and has 

 returned with photo, nest, eggs, young 

 in down and skin of parent bird of the 

 Little Brown Crane ( Orus canadensis) — 

 valuable additions to his unique series 

 of this species. 



Mr. Delos Hatch of Oakfield, Wis., an 

 old-time naturalist and collector, writes 

 that he has a live and pretty specimen 

 of the White Gopher (Albino Striped 

 Ground Squirrel). 



In a letter dated July 26, from Mr. D. 

 H. Haight, who is summering in Hamil- 

 ton County, N. Y., and who had an ar- 

 ticle in the January, 1899, Oologist on 

 "Nesting of the Duck Hawk in Hamil- 

 ton County, New York.'V He writes: 



"Remember those Duck Hawks I 

 wrote you about onceV Well, a pair 

 has raised a brood in exactly the same 

 place again this year. Probably the 

 young of the pair we shot. This morn- 

 ing I was up on the ledge and within 

 twenty feet of them— the old birds and 

 four young just well able to fly. I left 

 them undisturbed, although I could 

 have bagged the lot. They will un- 

 doubtedly nest here next year again. 



"It would be a great chance for some 

 museum if they wanted to get up a case 

 of this rare Hawk, also noted a Cardi- 

 nal Grosbeak here . Never heard of one 

 so far north before. Probably followed 

 the Hudson River valley up and thus 

 strayed up here." 



In a letter of recent date Ernest Shil- 

 labeer, secretary and director general 



