SPECIES EXTINCT OR EXTIRPATED. 455 



Woodruff of St. Catherines, Ont., Can., asserts that several 

 shipmasters say that immense numbers of Wild Pigeons 

 perished in the Gulf of Mexico, " being exhausted by contrary 

 winds and dense fogs." This gentleman also avers that Mr. 

 Woodruff states that several shipmasters saw myriads of 

 Pigeons alight on their vessels, and had to cast them off into 

 the sea. (Auk, 1901, p. 192, — no names or dates given.) 

 This is too indefinite to be of any value as evidence. Also, 

 there is no authentic record that the Passenger Pigeon ever 

 crossed the Gulf of Mexico. This species did not go so far 

 south, and, although there is a single record of its occurrence 

 in Cuba, it has not been seen in great numbers near the Gulf 

 coast for forty years. The Pigeons which once commonly 

 crossed these waters from Florida to Cuba in large numbers, 

 belonged to another species, the White-crowned Pigeon 

 (Columba leucocephala) . Such tales about the drowning of 

 birds in the Gulf of Mexico may have referred to some of the 

 Plovers, or " Prairie Pigeons," as they were called in the west, 

 which crossed the gulf annually in large numbers. 



The Passenger Pigeon was not exterminated, or nearly 

 exterminated, by drowning, soon after the nesting at Petoskey 

 in 1881; for, as hereinbefore stated, .there was an immense 

 flight in Texas the ensuing winter, a large flight crossed Michi- 

 gan to the north in 1888, and they were seen and taken in 

 numbers in many places in the United States and Canada for 

 years subsequent to the date of the Petoskey nesting of 1881. 

 The statement recently published in a magazine article, that 

 the Pigeons have gone to South America, is absolutely without 

 any foundation in fact. This bird is unknown on the South 

 American continent. The statement that they have gone to 

 Australia is hardly worth refuting. 



The stories of the wholesale destruction of the Pigeons by 

 snowstorms in the north possibly have some foundation. 

 Northward migrations of Pigeons often occurred very early in 

 the year, and the first nesting of a season was sometimes com- 

 pleted while snow still remained. On March 25, 1830, a flight 

 of Pigeons was overtaken by a high wind and snowstorm near 

 Albany, N. Y. Twenty-eight inches of snow fell, and the 



