July, 1920 FROM FIELD AND STUDY 159 
fication was due to the fact that suitable material was not at hand for comparison at 
the time that the collection containing this warbler was first studied and the skins iden- 
tified. Fortunately this erroneous record seems thus far to have been overlooked by 
others and so has not been quoted elsewhere.—ALEXANDER WETMORE, Biological Survey, 
Washington, D. C., May 26, 1920. 
Black-crowned Night Heron Gathering Nesting Material.—On April 27, 1920, while 
watching for Black-crowned Night Herons (Nycticorax nycticoraxr naevius) at the Cohen 
Estate, Buena Vista Avenue and Versailles, Alameda, California, one of the birds flew 
into a locust tree near at hand. It began stretching its neck and taking hold of small 
dead twigs with its bill, trying to break them off. After several attempts at different 
branches it found a twig that it could break and proceeded to carry it off. It seemed 
odd to find a bird that we associate with marshes and water gathering its nesting mate- 
rial in this manner.—Mkrs. G. EARLE KELLY, Alameda, California, May 28, 1920. 
Lizard Eaten by Cactus Wren.—While collecting in the tree yucca belt about three 
miles west of the town of Mohave, Kern County, California, on March 30, 1920, I shot 
4 male Cactus Wren (Heleodytes brunneicapillus couesi). When retrieved the bird was 
seen to have the abdomen slightly protuberant in the region of the gizzard as though 
the latter was unusually full. Upon dissection I found that the principal item of food, 
and the one which formed fully 95 percent of the contents of the gizzard was a Desert 
Brown-shouldered Lizard (Uta stansburiana elegans). The reptile was about two inches 
long. It had been swallowed entire although the head looked as though it had first been 
beaten almost to a pulp. I can find no previous record of a Cactus Wren taking reptiles 
for food. Beal (Biol. Surv. Bull. 30, 1907, pp. 64-65), in an examination of 41 stomachs 
from southern California, found insects to be the usual food, the only vertebrate material 
being some of the long bones of a tree frog. 
At the locality where this bird was taken there were very few cholla cactuses and 
the Cactus Wrens were using the tops of the tree yuccas as song perches.—Tracy I. 
STORER, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, Berkeley, California, May 14, 1920. 
Bohemian Waxwing in San Diego County.—On March 29, 1920, I found two dead 
and badly decomposed Bohemian Waxwings (Bombycilla garrula) on the camping ground 
at Vallecito, eastern San Diego County. Some one had shot them with a small caliber 
rifle. This is the first record for this county, I think. Cedar Waxwings (Bombycilla 
cedrorum) have been rather common here in San Diego for several weeks. They feed on 
the berries of the pepper trees —FRANK STEPHENS, San Diego, California, April 19, 1920. 
Notes from Escondido, California.x—On March 1 a friend brought me two Crossbills 
that were taken from a flock of six feeding in his orchard. Three were shot under the 
impression that they were Linnets. His cat got one and the other two, being shot with 
a 22 rifle, were pretty badly used up. Of one it was impossible to determine the sex: 
the other appeared to be a male. Both are young birds showing more or less of yellow 
in the plumage. A peculiarity of one of them is in the crossing of the upper mandible 
on the left. 
These birds appear to be Lozia curvirostra bendirei, and are the first Crossbills 
ever seen by me here, and as far as I know are the first recorded from this county. It 
is very possible that they may work south through the county in the higher mountains, 
hut so far none seems to have been reported, all authorities available giving the range 
as extending “as far south as Pasadena in winter”. 
The measurements of the two birds, in millimeters, are as follows: 
Bill from Depth of 
Length Wing Tail Tarsus Culmen nostril bill 
166 97 59 18 18.0 15.0 10 
166 94 5b 18 U5 14.5 10 
Another new record for this section is that for Molothrus ater obscurus, the Dwarf 
Cowbird. I have been looking for this species for many years, and I found my first egg 
in a nest of the Least Vireo (Vireo belli pusillus) at Fallbrook on June PIAS T9Y » Al 
