CATALOGUE OF CANADIAN BIRDS. 1 37 



I have carefully read Mr Ernest Seton-Thompson's account of 

 Grus mexicana in his Birds of Manitoba^ and am of the opinion 

 that some of his " Sandhill Cranes " were Grits cuTiadensis. Indeed 

 in quoting Dr. Coues he says that he (Coues) found this species 

 breeding west of Pembina when in reality Dr. Coues says it was 

 the Brown Crane he found there. See Coues on Birds of Dakota 

 and Montana, page 646. It is possible, however, that Dr. Coues 

 gave the wrong name to his species. 



In my earlier explorations I was mislead in this same way by 

 both cranes being called "Sandhill Cranes." In 1872 a specimen 

 of this species was caught with a lasso by one of our men, who 

 ran him down, when moulting in August of that year. This 

 specimen was much heavier than the 10 lb. specimens of Mr. 

 Seton-Thompson. Richardson's specimen, killed on Great Slave 

 Lake in 1822, was forty-eight inches long, so, that it was certainly 

 this species also. Fannin and Brooks say that it is a summer 

 resident in Southern British Columbia, but chiefly east of the Coast 

 Range, though not so common as the Little Brown Crane which 

 is, however, chiefly a migrant. 



Breeding Notes. — The Sandhill Crane comes to southern 

 Manitoba about the end of April, circling around high in the blue 

 and uttering its peculiar call. When mating it repairs to some 

 hillock or knoll and executes a sort of war dance by dancing 

 around and flapping its huge wings. It usually breeds on some 

 tussock of decaying vegetation in a marsh, building quite a large 

 nest of moss and rushes. I have never seen more than two eggs 

 in the nest. These are shaped and coloured very much like those 

 of the Loon, though perhaps, a little more pointed. The young 

 leave the nest almost immediately after hatching. They are 

 clothed with a thick ferrugineous down, and have legs about four 

 inches long. If caught when very young they are easily tamed, 

 readily eating bread or scraps of meat, and are of great service to 

 a gardener. I have seen one about a month old go down a line 

 of onions and take up every cut-worm from their roots, as if an 

 inch and a half of mould were perfectly transparent. After the 

 young are fully grown they gather into flocks of from twenty to 

 thirty and migrate southwards in the early autumn. {Cecil 

 Selwyn.) 



MUSEUM SPECIMEN. 



One fine specimen purchased with the Holman collection in 

 1885. 



