BIOLOGICAL RECONNOISSANCE AT FLATHEAD LAKE. 125 
These were all prepared in rolled zinc holders to keep their shape until 
they could dry. In the few wheat fields several flocks of sharp-tailed 
grouse were flushed. Western meadow larks were everywhere abund- 
ant. A few mourning doves, Zenaida macroura, were found around the 
grain fields. Solitary sandpipers, Totanus solitarius, were along the 
streams. In the bushes catbirds, Galeoscoptes carolinensis, blackbirds, 
Scolecophagus cyanocephalus, yellow warblers, Dendroica aestiva, Audu- 
bon’s warbler D. auduboni, flycatchers and otners were always to be seen. 
In the trees were black-headed grosbeaks, Habia melanocephalja, and 
woodpeckers, Lewis’, Melanerpes torquatus, and Harris’, Dryobates villo- 
sus harrisi. It was a pleasure to sit in camp and listen to the notes of the 
numerous species of birds. Over twenty were counted the first fore 
noon in camp, either by sight or by note. The total number seen during 
the few days at Crow creek is 43. Remembering that the creek forms 
but a narrow belt of vegetation in the valley, with dry plain and little 
vegetation on either side, this number is quite large. 
GLACIAL ACTION. 
Mission valley is undoubtedly glaciated. Between Crow creek and 
Post creek the valley contains many potholes, depressions in the surface 
which catch and hold water during the rainy season. At the lower end 
of the valley, near St. Ignatius Mission, large boulders lie high on the 
hills, while there are ridges and valleys plainly morainal. The valley and 
mountain range are worthy of careful study, and will repay the person 
who makes the study. 
The southern end of Mission valley has a much larger moraine than 
that at the foot of Flathead lake, mentioned in succeeding pages. It 
extends from the mountains on the east westward as far as Plains on the 
Northern Pacific. It may extend farther as the writer has not been 
over the ground. The. morainal matter in the vicinity of St. Ignatius 
makes hills several hundred feet high.* The height of these above this 
plain has not been determined, but it is certainly more than 500 feet. 
High up on these hills large boulders have been left stranded. The 
morainal matter here is badly broken and cut. The hills show plainly 
the presence of water in former times, beach marks being plainly visible 
from a long distance. 
The entire Mission valley is made from) glacial material, with high 
morainal deposit at both the northern and southern ends. The glacial 
drift extends many miles westward. It has not been followed, and the 
character of the soil cannot be given. The Pend d’Oreille river has cut 
a new channel through this valley, removing the glacial drift to bed 
rock. Whether this river drained the lake formerly covering Mission 
valley is for geologists to determine. 
No doubt some of this material came from the Mission range. The 
mass of it could not have done so. The Mission range extends north and 
south. The canyons opening into the valley open westward. In front 
of each of the larger canyons is a small morainal dam, extending generally 
from north to south, or parallel with the range. The large moraines pre- 
*It is possible the morainal deposit may be on a foothill, covering 
the rock. 
