May, 1908 THE PRESENT STATE OE THE ORNIS OF GUADALOUPE ISLAND 103 



of course responsible for the destruction of its flora and ornis. Brown and Mars- 

 den estimated the numbers of the goat to be between six and eight thousand. It 

 eats up every growing thing. All shrubs have long been exterminated and not a 

 young tree, palm, oak, pine or cypress can be found in the island. The cat is also 

 very numerous and undoubtedly has caused the extinction of two of the island's 

 native birds — the towhee and the Guadaloupe wren — while the rock wren, junco, 

 flicker and petrel, suffer much from its depredations. The house mouse {Mus 

 musaihis) has become established in Guadaloupe and is exceedingly abundant, but 

 it probably does but little harm, while it undoubtedly furnishes the main diet of 

 the burrowing owl and sparrow hawk. 



Guadaloupe is at present uninhabited by man. 



lyiST OF Birds Sken or Taken by Brown and Marsden 



Diom.edia nigripes Aud. Seven specimens, adults of both sexes, were taken 

 at sea near the island, on June 27 and 28. 



Puffinus opisthomelas Coues. Three specimens were taken in June. Mr. 

 Brown says of this shearwater — "this species was abundant at night about the per- 

 pendicular cliffs east of our cabins, on the lower tableland, their cries resounding 

 throughout the night. At day they frequented the waters off the extreme north- 

 ern end of the island. From the high cliffs they could be constantly seen skim- 

 ming over the ocean 1,000 feet below; often there were from forty to fifty in sight 

 at one time. 



' 'Along the top of the bluffs we found the remains of three or four that had been 

 killed by cats. The bird almost certainly breeds in the rocky crevices of the bluffs, 

 but we could not prove this, as the perpendicular chffs are inaccessible. 



"On our return trip from Guadaloupe shearwaters of this species were con- 

 stantly in sight. Off the bar at San Quintin there were thousands upon thousands 

 of them — I think I never before have seen so many birds at one time." 



Puffinus griseus (Gmel.). Two specimens were taken at sea near Guadaloupe 

 in June. 



Oceanodroma macrodactyla Bryant. A series of a dozen adults and three 

 young in the down was taken between the dates of May 28 and June 17, and one 

 egg May 28. 



Mr. Brown's notes on this species are as follows: "This species was abundant 

 at night about its nesting burrows on the pine ridge at the northern end of the 

 island. Most of the burrows that we opened were empty, the breeding season be- 

 ing about over; three, however, contained one young one each, and one, one ^%^. 



"The burrows were of various lengths and usually led between or under heavy 

 fragments of rock, making it very difficult, in many cases impossible, to reach the 

 end. We found no adult birds in the burrows. After the young are hatched the 

 old birds appear to come in only at night to feed them. The one ^^g we secured 

 was in a deserted burrow fifteen inches long, and lay in a somewhat enlarged de- 

 pression at the end. It was white with a faint wreath of reddish brown specks at 

 the larger end. 



"The mortality among these birds from the depredations of the cats that over- 

 run the island is appalling — wings and feathers lie scattered in every direction 

 around the burrows along the top of the pine ridge. The species, however, is still 

 breeding in large numbers in Guadaloupe, and sometimes at night the air seemed 

 to be fairly alive with petrels, their peculiar cries being heard on all sides." 



Phalacrocorax sp. "Two cormorants were several times seen off the southern 



