52 THE OOLOGIST 
little recreation, and is again giving 
attention to Oology. He has recently 
come into the possession of the en- 
tire collection formerly belonging to 
Mr. HE. A. Doolittle. 
As May is the great migration 
month for Warblers and the month in 
which many of the rarer species nest 
in the middle and southern parts of 
the United States, we propose issuing 
a special Warbler number the coming 
month of May. No bird lover interest- 
edzin this interesting family of birds 
can afford to do without this issue. 
F, A. W. Dean of Alliance, Ohio, re- 
ports an Albino Bob-white which he 
has recently mounted. He likewise re- 
ports the rumor of an entire covey of 
these birds near Edna, Ohio. If so, 
it is truly to be hoped that they will 
be rigorously protected in the hopes of 
developing a race of this character of 
birds. 
As this issue goes to press, the Edi- 
tor is on his way to Moose Jaw, in 
Southern Saskatchewan on a business 
trip, but will not fail to observe any of 
the feathered tribe that fall under our 
vision during our absence, and only 
regret that we are unable to stay and 
experience an early Spring’s collecting 
in Southern Saskatchewan as last sea- 
son we experienced a late Spring’s col- 
lecting season in Central Saskatche- 
wan. 
——__—_______+-~—>_e—__ —__ —_ ——_ 
There Are Few of This Kind. 
Malcolm W. Rix, 23 Vrant St., Utica, 
New York, is one of the few, very few 
who are built upon such a minute 
scale as to take THE OOLOGIST for 
a number of years, and then refuse to 
pay for it or further accept it. It is 
a pleasure to us and a benefit to oolo- 
gists in general to be rid of such. 
Prairie Falconing. 
By Fred Truesdale. 
The Prairie Falcon is more or less 
common in certain parts of California 
and extends to the Eastern border of 
the plains. Their length is 16.20, 
wing 12-14, tail 6-9, culmen 1 inch. 
They can easily be identified by the 
cackle, and the blackish patch on the 
sides of throat. Their food consists 
chiefly of small mammals, birds and 
occasionally chickens which they 
eatch. The flight is very rapid, rap- 
id enough to catch a pigeon on the 
wing. oe 
I have seen this facon fly into a flock 
of chickens and strike one, and leave 
it lie on the ground, returning again 
and get another one in the same man- 
ner, until they have killed off nine 
chickens. They are very injurious to 
the chicken men, They are very shy 
and therefore, it is very hard to get 
a shot at one of them. 
During the winter of 1909 there 
were a pair of them that stayed in a 
tree near the town of Shandon, Cali- 
fornia, but alas! someone killed them 
in the early spring, or they left in 
search of a place to nest. 
One day in March last, I set out to 
find where these birds made _ their 
nests. After a three days trip I had 
located four pair of the birds in San 
Guis County, and four nests of the 
Ames Raven. The first being nearly 
complete; the other three just start- 
ed. On the 18th of March J made an- 
other visit to the first nest. It then 
contained six fresh eggs, but was a 
very difficult nest to get to, and I had 
to make a trip home to get a better 
line of tools, getting more rope and 
some good pegs to put in the ground to 
tie to. 
This nest was on a small shelf and 
the cliff seventy feet high. The nest 
twenty feet from the top. The cliff 
was a little overhanging, the dirt being 
very soft. I was afraid that, 
it might tumble into the 
nest on the _ eggs. I secured 
the eggs, but at a risk of getting them 
all smashed up; but two of them were 
dented up a little. 
In April I made another trip and 
found a set of five eggs of Prairie 
Falcon. The cliff was 120 feet high 
and sixty feet straight up from the bot- 
tom was the nest in a sort of cup 
rounded out by the birds. I fixed my 
outfit and secured the set; all five of 
these eggs were of a purplish color, 
and were nearly fresh. Of all Falcon 
eggs I have seen, I never saw a set 
- like it before. 
I made still another trip in June 
and secured three more of these eggs, 
half incubated, of the same type. Most 
of the eggs I have seen were reddish 
buff, blotched with brown, or red and 
brown, being sometimes very heavily 
marked. 
