1881.] Ona few of the Diseases and Injuries in Birds. 283 
NOTES ON A FEW OF THE DISEASES AND Se were 
IN BIRDS. 
BY R. W. SHUFELDT, M.D., U.S. A. 
v is merely the object of this brief essay to call attention to 
the fact that has on so many occasions been so vividly pre- 
sented to me, during the course of my dissections of bodies of 
birds and the preparation of their skeletons, of really how com- 
paratively few of them there are that can boast of being perfectly 
free and exempt from any form of disease or the sequela of dis- 
ease ; and not to make any attempt to classify or write any ex- 
tended description of those diseases and injuries to which birds 
_ are subject. One among the first cases that was brought to my 
notice occurred some fifteen years ago, while on a collecting tour 
in the State of Connecticut, at a period before I could lay barely 
any claim to the knowledge of disease or make any use of what I 
observed. In passing through the woods on that occasion I 
picked up from the ground a nearly full grown female Molothrus 
pecoris, that could barely hop along atid was totally unable to fly. 
She was extremely emaciated and ill-nourished. My curiosity 
as to the cause of her disability was soon satisfied when I began 
to part the feathers to search for some injury that perhaps she 
had sustained. My first anticipations were quickly dispelled, for 
instead of any injury, I discovered the integument in various 
localities, particularly the wings and breast, raised up in rather a 
tent-like manner, in some eighteen or twenty places. Each o 
these little pockets was occupied by a yellowish-white larva as 
large as an ordinary white garden bean. These I easily removed, 
one by one, with a piece of straw, and carried my bird, apparently 
now much relieved, to the nearest water, some little distance, 
where she drank as if she had never beheld that fluid before. 
My surprise now was not very great when, upon releasing her, I 
found that she could fly some little distance, and undoubtedly 
subsequently entirely recovered. As I have never seen a similar 
case, I am to this day ignorant of the habits or even the name of 
the parasite. 
Another remarkable, although common, case of parasite oc- 
curs in Spheotyto, our burrowing owl of the plains. The best 
example of this I saw in one of these birds two or three years 
ago. This specimen, too, I could actually pick up from the en- 
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