A SEARCH FOR BIRDS AND MAMMALS 

 IN KENTUCKY 



By W. M. PERRYGO 



Scientific Aid, Division of Mammals, U. S. National Museum 



Kentucky has long remained a section whose bird and mammal life 

 was represented in the United States National Museum by few speci- 

 mens, so that it was with interest that I undertook a survey that was 

 to cover much of the State. Arrangements were made with Maj. 

 James Brown, Commissioner of Game and Fish, Department of Con- 

 servation, for the necessary permits, and through his kind offices we 

 received aid without which the work could not have been successful. 



With James Cole as assistant, I left Washington on April 15, 1938, 

 to begin work a few days later near Brandenburg, in Meade County, 

 in a region of rolling hills and the level bottomlands along the Ohio 

 River. We remained here for 2 weeks collecting many interesting 

 specimens, including the Bachman's sparrow, and various kinds of 

 mice. 



Leaving here we went to the extreme southwestern part of the 

 State, near the Mississippi River, to investigate an area in the Austro- 

 riparian life zone at the northern end of Reel foot Lake. Only a small 

 portion of the lake, or the arms, as they are locally called, extends 

 across the State line, but our observations gave much of interest to 

 supplement the material obtained last year in the adjacent Tennessee 

 section. Our collecting here was done in beautiful cypress swamps 

 and around the edges of the many cotton fields. 



We moved then to Monticello to investigate the dry oak-wooded 

 hills of Wayne County and then, working our way northward into 

 Harlan County, put up in an abandoned C. C. C. camp near Cumber- 

 land. This gave us easy access to Black Mountain, southeast of 

 Lynch, the highest mountain in the State, with an altitude of 4,150 

 feet. Black Mountain is unlike the higher mountains of West Virginia 

 and Tennessee in that it lacks the typical Canadian zone, having no 

 spruce or balsam trees. Here, in spite of continuous rains and dense 

 fogs, we obtained many interesting specimens, one being a new type 

 of red-backed mouse. This was our first experience in catching mice 

 of this group in flying squirrel traps set on trees. 



After 2 days' work on Pine Mountain, in Letcher County, we 

 moved northeastward to Belfry, a mining town in Pike County, where 



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