408 W. UPHAM ESKER NEAR WINNIPEG^ MANITOBA 





smoothl}' rounded top and the moderately steep or mostly very gentle 

 slopes on each side^ ranges from 500 to 1,500 feet, being mainly about 

 1,000 feet. Thus it differs from a majority of eskers in being broader 

 and lower and in having less steep sides than the average type of its 

 class of drift formations. 



Because Birds Hill is the nearest plentiful source of builders' sand 

 and gravel ballast for construction in the large and fast growing city of 

 Winnipeg, its excavated sections are freshly and clearly exposed to view, 

 with relatively little obscuration by falling talus slopes. The excavations 

 now are several times greater than in 1887, when I first examined this 

 gravel ridge, during my surveys of the Glacial Lake Agassiz. It then 

 seemed to me exceedingly interesting and instructive, so that a small 

 map, showing the esker and its vicinity, and a section along its earliest 

 excavation, already reaching nearly three-fourths of a mile eastward from 

 Birds Hill Station, were presented in my reports of that glacial lake.^ 

 But the observations made in August and September, 1909, on the Brit- 

 ish Association excursion, and in two later trips, have enabled me to 

 learn the structure, geographic and geologic relationship, and the signifi- 

 cance of this very remarkable esker far more satisfactorily than before. 



Origin of the Name 



A pioneer settler, Dr. J. C. Bird, widely known as a skillful physician, 

 who lived many years in Saint Pauls township or parish, on the west 

 side of the Eed Eiver, opposite to this hill, is commemorated in its 

 name, which later was applied to the railway station when this first rail- 

 way traversing Manitoba was built. Doctor Bird was elected a member 

 of the first Legislature of Manitoba, in 1870; was speaker of the House 

 from February 5, 1873, to the end of that Legislature, in 1874, and was 

 reelected for Saint Pauls in the general elections of that year. He died 

 in England in 1876.^ 



This dry, sandy esker ridge was often visited in the early spring and 

 during the summer by Doctor Bird, and likewise by Hon. James W. 

 Taylor, the United States consul in Winnipeg, 1870-1893, for gathering 

 its wild flowers, including the pasque-flower, the earliest in spring, and 

 many other species which are common on the esker but are rare or absent 

 on the surrounding level and mostly clayey country. 



' Geological and Natural History Survey of Canada, Annual Report, new series, vol. 

 Iv, for 1888-89 (published in 1890), part E, pp. 38-40, with a section. 



U. S. Geological Survey Monograph xxv, 1895, pp. 183-187, with map and section, 

 « History of Manitoba, by Robert B. Hill, 1890, p. 764. 



