136 Cincinnati Socrety of Natural History. 
A LIST OF THE BIRDS OF BARDSTOWN NES ON CO; 
KENTUCKY. 
By Cuarves WICKLIFFE BECKHAM. 
The following list represents, principally, the results of observations 
made by the writer during parts of five years, on the Birds of the 
vicinity of Bardstown, Nelson county, Kentucky. 
Bardstown is situated in N. Lat. 37° 52’; W. Long. 85° 18’, and is 
just on the western limit of the ‘‘ Blue Grass Region.” It is forty 
miles southeast of Louisville, and about one hund red southwest of Cin- 
cinnati. Two or three miles northeast of the town, the ‘“ Trenton’’ 
limestone, the characteristic surface rock of the blue-grass country, dis- 
appears and is succeeded by magnesium (commonly called ‘‘cavernous’” ) 
limestone, which, in turn, gives place several miles west of the town to 
the shaly deposits of the Devonian Age. Hence, the sylvan growth 
partakes of the peculiarities of both formations. The most character- 
istic trees are beech, red and white oak, black walnut, butternut, cedar, 
“yellow poplar’ (local for Liriodendron tulipifera), sycamore, black 
gum, dog wood, white elm and hickory (Carya alba, tomentosa et 
glabra). The country is gently undulating, and is mostly in a high 
state of cultivation. In summer the greater part of the small water- 
courses become dry, and there is, of course, a corresponding scarcity of 
“that desirable liquid. In the western part of the county there are still 
many large tracts of wild, uncultivated land, where such birds as the 
Pileated Woodpecker, the Ruffed Grouse, and the Wild Turkey rear 
their “interesting families,” in peace. and prosperity, undisturbed by 
the sanguinary pursuit of their hereditary enemies—the sportsman, 
the “small boy,” and the ornithologist. 
The list represents hardly twe thirds of the birds that are doubtless 
to be found here, but it is thoroughly trustworthy as far as it goes; 
for no species has been admitted on any but the best of evidence: out 
of the one hundred and sixty-seven enumerated, the writer is himself 
responsible for all but eight of them. 
As a plausible raison d@’etre for this paper, it is urged that not a 
single article on the birds of Kentucky, as such, has ever been pub- 
lished. | 
The nomenclature adopted, is that of the Smithsonian List of 1881. 
Species known to breed here are marked with an asterisk (*), those 
strongly inferred to do so by a dagger (t+). 
