December 19, 1890. — The President in the chair. Ten persons 

 present. 



Mr. Geo. B. Sermett occupied the evening with a paper on 'Water 

 Birds that live in the Woods/ About a dozen species were dealt 

 with, the most interesting of them perhaps being the Tree Ducks 

 (Dendrocygna autumnalis el fulvd). The former is found in the 

 heaviest timber along the Rio Grande of Texas, at Lomita, and as this 

 river furnishes no sort of food, it adapts itself to circumstances and 

 feeds upon seeds or grain. These ducks will alight upon a stalk of 

 growing corn with the ease of a blackbird and are quite at home 

 among the lofty trees where they make their nests. They do not 

 resort to the river which is so cold and muddy, from the melting 

 snows of the mountains whence it flows, that all vegetable and 

 animal life save the garpike is wanting. No ducks of any kind 

 are found upon it. 



A flock of Cormorants, about four miles long and one and one-half 

 a mile wide, was once seen by Mr. Sennett in Minnesota. 



Mr. Sennett reported the capture of a Limpkin {Aramus giganteus) 

 near Brownsville, Tex., May 29, 1889, tne ^ rst record for the west 

 Gulf coast. It was a fine adult male and the bird was not 

 known to the natives or gunners' who saw it when shot. 



Mr. Chapman presented some remarks upon the Gopher or Sala- 

 mander {Geomys tuzd) of Florida, illustrated with specimens of this 

 as well as allied species. Their retiring habits, burrowing beneath 

 the ground as they do, render them far less well known than they 

 should be, considering how abundant they are in many parts of the 

 peninsula. There is no more familiar sight in the pine woods than 

 the mounds of earth they throw up, in forming their burrows. They 

 have pouches on either side of their mouths opening externally instead 

 of internally as some people suppose. 



Dr. J. A. Allen gave an interesting explanation of how traces of 

 Sonoran life might be geologically accounted for in Florida, the 

 Gopher being a case in point. 



January 9, 1891. — The Vice-President in the chair. Eleven per- 

 sons present. 



A letter from Mr. Arthur H. Norton furnishes a record (the 6th) 

 of the Leather-backed Turtle (Sphargis coriacea) in New England 

 waters, — a specimen secured August, 1890, in Penobscot Bay, Maine. 



The capture of a Glaucous Gull (Larus glaucus) at Far Rockaway, 



