1897.] Proceedings of Scientific Societies. 187 
Allen and Dr. and Mrs. Britton will be published in the Budletin, that 
by Dr. Rusby in the Druggists’ Cireular. On motion the Club ad- 
journed to meet on the second Tuesday in January. 
H. H. Russy, Ree. Secretary. 
Chicago Academy of Sciences.—A regular meeting of the 
Academy of Sciences was held Tuesday evening, December 22, 1890. 
Prof. Willis L. Moore was elected a corresponding member. Mr. 
Frank M. Woodruff, Ornithologist of the Academy, read a paper on 
“ Recent Occurrences of Rare Birds in Chicago.” 
The speaker remarked that he had been collecting data and speci- 
mens during the past year for the Ornithological Report of the Geo- 
logical and Natural History Survey, and had been fortunate enough 
while engaged in this work to run across a number of rare species. 
The most favorable time for collecting these rarities is when Lake 
Michigan is almost frozen over, or during the months of January and 
February, after the wind has changed from an easterly direction and 
is blowing from the west. The east wind breaks up the ice and the 
west wind drives the broken floes away from the shore, leaving at 
times a long stretch of clear water, with here and there a small patch 
of ice; in this open water the ducks and gulls gather by thousands to 
feed upon dead fish and sewerage, and they may then be collected very 
readily. Many of the birds gathering here at this time are inhabitants 
of Alaska and Northern British America. 
The rarest bird taken was a specimen of an immature male Kittiwake 
Gull (Rissa tridactyla) which was shot by Mr. Wagner on the 9th of 
December near Lincoln Park. This is the first record of a specimen 
of this bird being shot in Illinois. Barrows Golden-eye ( Glaucinetta 
islandica) was seen recently in large flocks, and two specimens were 
shot, one of which got away, but the other was captured and is now in 
the Academy’s collection. This species is rare, and there are but few 
records of its capture. The Old Squaw (Olaugula hiemalis) is seen 
commonly about Chicago, but is seldom taken. Mr. Woodruff men- 
tioned the following additional more or less rare species : White-winged 
Scoter (Oidemia deglandi) ; Velvet Scoter (O. fusca, at Meredosia) ; 
Robin Snipe or Knot (Tringa canutus); Buff-breasted Sandpiper 
(Tryngites subruficollis) ; Baird’s Sandpiper (Tringa bairdii) ; Piping 
Plover (Aigialitis meloda) ; Black-bellied Plover (Charadrius squata- 
rola); Stilt Sandpiper (Micropalama himantopus); Willet (Symp hemia 
semipalmata) ; Turnstone (Arenaria interpres) ; Harlan’s Hawk (Buteo 
borealis harlani) and American Goshawk ( Accipiter atricapillus). The 
