BALDPATE. 



29 



migration. Northeastward the species is known as a rare migrant, in 

 New England hardly more than a straggler, but it has been recorded 

 as far as Newfoundland, southern Labrador (Natashquan), and north- 

 ern Ontario (Moose River). The baldpate is rather rare on the coast 

 of Alaska, but is more common in the interior, and is a rare or casual 

 visitor to the Near, Commander, and Bermuda islands. 



Winter range. — The baldpate is common on the Chesapeake in win- 

 ter, but as it is rare directly to the northward at all times of the year, 

 it is evident that the migration is from the northwest. Occasionally 

 birds are found in winter as far north as Rhode Island. The species 

 is common during the winter in the Carolinas, less common in Florida 

 and Cuba, and rare in the Bermudas, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Porto 

 Rico, St. Thomas, and Trinidad. It is recorded from Costa Rica, and 

 is a rather common winter resident of northern Guatemala and much 

 of Mexico north of the Valley of Mexico. The winter home in the 

 Mississippi Valley extends north to Illinois, and in the west to New 

 Mexico, Arizona, Utah (probably), and to southern British Columbia. 

 It is probably most common during the winter along the Pacific coast. 



Spring migration. — This begins late in February and by early March 

 the species is north of its winter home. Average dates of arrival are: 

 Western New York, March 23; Erie, Pa., March 24; Oberlin, Ohio, 

 March 17; southern Michigan, March 25; Keokuk, Iowa, March 15; 

 central Nebraska, March 17; Loveland, Colo., March 10. The further 

 advance of the species is somewhat slow. The average time of reach- 

 ing Heron Lake, Minn., is March 29; southern Manitoba, April 20; 

 Terry, Mont., April 8. The first individual was seen at Indian Head, 

 Saskatchewan, April 24, 1904, and at Osier, Saskatchewan, May 2, 1893. 

 These dates indicate an average speed of 17 miles per day from central 

 Nebraska to Heron Lake, and 18 miles per day thence to southern 

 Manitoba. The average rate from Colorado to Montana is 16 miles 

 per day, and the same rate continued northward would bring the first 

 baldpate to Indian Head and Osier at almost exactly the stated dates. 

 If the birds of the Mississippi Valley pass northwest to the Mackenzie 

 Valley, this rate of migration would bring them to Great Slave Lake 

 about the first week in June, whereas the first arrival at Fort Simp- 

 son, Mackenzie, was April 28, 1904; and a female was shot at Fort 

 Resolution May 24, I860, which contained a fully formed egg. It is' 

 evident, then, that the earliest arrivals in the Mackenzie Valley come 

 from the southwest, where, in southern British Columbia, the species 

 winters a thousand miles farther north than on the plains. The bald- 

 pate arrives at the mouth of the Yukon in early May, and on the Knik 

 River, Alaska, the first bird was noted May 10, 190J . Most of the 

 few spring records in New England are in April, two in February, 

 but the species is apparently less common in the spring than in the 

 fall. The last migrants usually leave Cuba late in April, though in 

 Guatemala they have been seen as late as May. 



