THE HUDSONIAN CHICKADEE AND ITS ALLIES, 

 WITH REMARKS ON THE GEOGRAPHIC DIS- 

 TRIBUTION OF BIRD RACES IN BOREAL 

 AMERICA. 



BY SAMUEL N. KHOADS. 



While examining the series of I'arzis hiidsonicus at the 

 Smithsonian Institution to determine the status of Parus hudso?t- 

 icus columbianus, Mr. Ridgway suggested to me the desira- 

 bility of a careful study of the affinities of the several members 

 of this group described by authors. A request for specimens 

 was made in my description of the British Columbian form of 

 hudsonicus in 'The Auk' for January, 1893. No answers to 

 this appeal were received, and after a lapse of two months I 

 started a correspondence with several of the most prominent col- 

 lectors for the loan of skins. From five of these I received, in 

 all, twenty-five specimens, Mr. Brewster sending seventeen, 

 Prof. J. Macoun two, Mr. K. C. McIIwraith four, Mr. A. G. 

 Kingston one, and the Natural History Society of Toronto one. 

 Several of my Canadian correspondents, from whom I had 



Natural Sciences at an early date in order that they may be 

 examined, with the original series, at the next meeting of the 

 A. O. U. Committee on Nomenclature. 



The Hudsonian Chickadee, Parus hudsonicus, was first 

 described by J. R. Forster in the Transactions of the London Phil- 

 osophical Society for 1773. His description was based on speci- 

 mens sent him from the Hudson's Bay post at Fort Severn, on 

 the southwest coast of Hudson's Bay, at the mouth of the Severn 

 River. Since that time three races of Parus hudsonicus and 

 one closely related species, now classed by the A. O. U. as a 

 subspecies, have been described. 



