THE NIDIOLOGIST 



\ijLi.\u ui' RH\.\CHul'b NIGRA. 

 (From a photograph by Dr. Shufeldt.) 



An Inland Rookery of Phalacro= 

 corax d. albociliatus. 



[Read before the Cooper Ornithological Club, 

 September, 1S95.] 



THE breeding area of this species as given 

 by Coues is, " Farallon Islands to Cape 

 St. Lucas." 



Having found these birds breeding more than 

 one hundred and twenty-five miles north of 

 these limits, and in a manner somewhat unusual 

 to this class of birds, I prepared the following 

 notes as being of interest to the members of the 

 Club. 



Early in March, 1895, 1 visited Lakeport, a 

 small town on the west shore of beautiful Clear 

 Lake, in Lake County. 



The lake consists of two basins connected by 

 a channel and forming together a body of water 

 twenty-five miles long and eight miles broad. 



In winter, the surface of the lake rises con- 

 siderably and floods quite a margin of lowland 

 at some points along the shore. 



In such low places a fine growth of tules 

 spring up as the water recedes, and frequently 

 extend several hundred yards out where the 

 water is shallow. 



Big Valley, lying on the south side of the 



up|)er basin of the lake, is a forest of large 

 white oaks. These trees extend down toward 

 the lake as far as the moist soil will support 

 them. Some trees standing within a hundred 

 yards of the low-water mark are wholly or par- 

 tially dead, as though the unfavorable moisture 

 of the soil had early completed the work of se- 

 nile decay. 



In such a place, where they were within easy 

 reach of their feeding grounds, the Cormorants 

 occupied a rookery that had been in use many 

 years. From Lakeport I could see, some three 

 miles distant, across a bend in the lake, the 

 white outline of a large dead tree against the 

 dark background of the forest. On the morn- 

 ing of April 29, in company with a friend, I left 

 Lakeport and headed for this dead tree. Never 

 was there a more beautiful day for a row on 

 the lake. Recent rains had left the air so crisp 

 and clear that every deep breath seemed full of 

 ozone, and all the objects about us appeared 

 just out of reach. 



A breeze that barely swelled the smooth sur- 

 face of the water bore to us the fragrance from 

 the flowery shore. Before us, slowly falling 

 back, the quaint little town of Lakeport lay 

 against the low hills; at our backs, as we ap- 

 proached, there rose a mighty mountain, a soli- 

 tary and majestic body jutting out between the 



