THE CANADIAN SPORTSMAN AND NATURALIST. 



WOODCOCK IN DECEMBER. 



Early on the morning of the 16th December 

 a man captured a woodcock which was run- 

 ning on the ground in the vicinity of Beaver 

 Hall Terrace in this city. This fact would not 

 have been ascertained, were it not for the num- 

 erous telegraph wires which surround the 

 streets. During the previous night, the bird, 

 in its southern flight, struck against a wire with 

 force sufficient to take off the skin and feathers, 

 from the front portion of the head, above the 

 base of its beak. Many woodcock are killed 

 in the spring and fall by telegraph wires, as 

 they migi-ate only at night, and generally fly 

 low. The bird was brought to the Sportsman 

 Office, the man being ignorant as to its name. 

 Having no immediate accommodation for this 

 interesting game bird, we sent it to Mr. Hall's 

 restaurant, on St. James street, where it was 

 living on Christmas eve. It may not be gener- 

 ally known to Sportsmen or Naturalists, that 

 the woodcock has the power to erect about half 

 an inch of the upper mandible, without open- 

 ing the beak to its base. It appears as if the 

 bird was supplied with a flexor nerve to elevate 

 the tip of the upper mandible. This feature 

 was quite remarkable in the above specimen. 

 It is supposed that these late woodcock have 

 been living in the vicinity of warm springs on 

 the Laurentian Mountains. 



REPORT ON NOMENCLATURE. 



We have received the Third Annual Book of 

 the Michigan Sportsman's Association for 1880. 

 It contains ninety-seven pages of interesting 

 matter. Considering the fifth Committee Report 

 valuable to Canadian Sportsmen and Natural- 

 ists, we publish the first portion in this issue 

 of our journal. 



Your Committee on " Nomenclature, both 

 Popular and Scientific/' would respectfully 

 report; That uniform and correct names 

 should be habitually employed in speaking 

 and writing of the different species of game. 

 On account of the loose'way of naming animals 



in vogue in this country, many otherwise well- 

 written articles beeome quite unintelligible. In 

 reading of field sports we are constantly in the 

 position of Mr. A., who was informed by his 

 friend B. that he had just scooped Mr. Johns 

 of a cool $100 at poker. Mr. Johns being A.'s 

 clergyman, and a very examplary man, an 

 explanation was demanded, when it was ascer- 

 tained that it was not Mr. Johns at all that had 

 been relieved of his money, but Jones, the 

 gamester. Such carelessness in the use of names 

 is reprehensible and never necessary. And yet 

 in writing of game, one will give a description 

 of a day with the partridges. As there are two 

 species of birds called by that name, we are 

 left in doubt as to which he means. Another 

 has been shooting elk. Does he mean wapiti, 

 or the true elk, commonly called moose? 

 Another has caught a fine string of pickerel 

 in the clear waters of Niagara river. We 

 doubt the fact and the habitat. On investiga- 

 tion we find he enjoyed the superior sport of 

 taking pike-perch. The same species receive 

 different names in different places, and different 

 species receive the same name. Some kinds 

 are called by names that properly belong to 

 other species, and thus the mixing and mud 

 dling goes on. One fish has received nineteen 

 different names within a few hundred miles on 

 the Atlantic coast. Herring are said to be 

 taken in Lake Michigan, when it is known that 

 there is not a herring west of the Niagara 

 river, except such as are brought here dried 

 or pickled. And so we might go orr almost 

 indefinitely depicting the ridiculousness of 

 popular nomenclature. But the annoying fact 

 is too well known to require amplification. 

 Nor are we much better off when we turn to 

 scientific classification and nomenclature ; for 

 ambitious naturalists are constantly re-arrang- 

 ing both. 



What constitutes classification and nomen- 

 clature ? Accepting the testimony of lexico- 

 graphers, the first is ah arrangement or distri- 

 bution of groups in classes, orders, families, 

 genera^ and species, according to common 



