138 THE CONDOR Vol. XXII1 
in their migrational flights would be most interesting, and I hope that others can, per- 
haps, give us some valuable and interesting light on this subject. At this time I would 
like to mention also, observations made on the actions of flocks of mixed species of 
gulls, which I have not previously seen recorded. 
The spit of land which makes San Diego Bay a land-locked harbor terminates in 
two flat areas of land: Coronado Island and North Island, each 2 or 8 miles in diam- 
eter and entirely surrounded by water. North Island, in particular, presents a large 
expanse of level, treeless surface to the sun, and on a calm warm day a large volume 
of dry warm air develops over this area, surrounded by the cooler and moister air over 
the water. The ascension of the warm, light air over such a field is familiar to avi- 
ators, and the gulls in this vicinity seem to delight in ascending with it. , 
Starting two or three hundred feet up, they commence to ascend in long sweeping 
spirals. Their wings are extended and no perceptible motion of the body can be noted, 
and up, up they sail until almost out of sight, and straining the eye to follow them. 
They start with perhaps a dozen or two birds, but these are soon joined from all direc- 
tions by other gulls in two’s and three’s until 100 to 200 birds are in the air at once. It 
is quite a pretty sight and suggests to one a column of numerous sheets of paper carried 
aloft by some giant whiriwind, reaching upward as high as the eye can follow. They 
appear to sail very leisurely but they gain altitude with surprising rapidity. I have 
made some effort to estimate the height they attain but find it very difficult on account 
of the lack of anything stable in the sky with which to compare them. 
When evidently satisfied with their evolutions the gulls disband, many of the 
birds volplaning to earth again to resume their never-ending quest for food, but others 
seem to use this method for gaining altitude for a long flight, perhaps to some neigh- 
boring island, as the last one sees of them as they disappear irem sight, they are still 
sailing, with their wings outstretched, toward the distant horizon—C. H. Woopwarp, 
San Diego, California, April 16, 1921. 
White-throated Sparrow in Orange County.—On March 19, 1921, a single White- 
throated Sparrow (Zonotrichia albicollis) appeared in a small flock, made up of about 
twenty Intermediate Sparrows and a few Goiden-crowned Sparrows that frequented a 
large pile of brush about thirty feet from. our house. It was very easy to get a close 
view of it, from the windows, as it fed most of the time about the back-yard. It was 
seen nearly every day until April 10, when all of the flock left—Jo11n McB. ROBERTSON, 
Buena Park, Orange County, California, May 15, 1921. 
Philadelphia Vireo in Montana.—Saunders’ list of the birds of Montana contains 
no record of the occurrence of the Philadelphia Vireo (Vireosylva philadelphica) in the 
State. A female bird was taken by H. E. Anthony, while collecting in company with 
the writer, near Johnson Lake, Sheridan County, Montana, on June 3, 1910. This re- 
gion is rolling prairie, with only a sparse growth of boxelder, elm, and willow along the 
infrequent streams, and the bird was taken in one of these patches of timber. In spite 
of the comparatively late date, the bird was undoubtedly a migrant. The specimen is 
now no. 228,547, U. S. Nat. Mus. (Biological Survey collection).—EpWarp A. PREBLE, 
Washington, D. C., May 18, 1921. 
Western Bluebird Nesting on the Sea-coast.—The published accounts of the breed- 
ing of the Western Bluebird (Sialia mexicana occidentalis) on the coastal plain are so 
few that the following note may be worth recording. There are at this writing (May 
15, 1921) at least four pairs of Bluebirds in Carpinteria on the narrow plain that 
stretches from the last foothill to the ocean, in territory less than 50 feet above sea- 
level. I have located two of the nests. One is probably as near the ocean as the spe- 
cies is likely to nest. It is in a willow, in the last group of trees between the Coast 
Highway and the sea, so near a salt marsh that a very high tide would come within 5¢ 
rods of the nest—RatrH HorrMann, Carpinteria, California, May 15, 1921. 
