Ridgway on an Apparently New Heron from Florida . 3 
of my camping'place and noting the rookeries of large Herons 
. . . . these birds were quite common in that vicinity, 
while I saw only a few specimens of A. occidentalis. The 
white bird found in the nest with the blue might have come there 
from an adjoining empty nest, some 30 or 40 feet distant, as it 
could easily have done, being nearly full-grown. This surmise 
is strengthened by the circumstance that I saw a large white 
Heron on the island marked 4 and my companion killed a 
similar, if not the same, specimen on the large island marked 
4 2,’ which he threw away, supposing it to be a common White 
Egret \_Herodias egretta~\. These I now believe to have been 
A. occidentalis ; the other \_H. egretta~\ was then laying its 
eggs, while the description of A. occidentalis corresponds to 
my recollection of the bird he killed. At the time, I was not 
familiar with the description of A. occidentalis. 
44 In the Little Blue Heron \_Florida ccerulea~\ and Reddish 
Egret ( Dichromanassa rufa ), where dichromatism appears to 
be an established fact, each species presents different phases and 
mixtures of both colors, especially the Little Blue, which shows 
almost every variety of curious fnarkings of blue and white ; 
while in the Reddish Egret, one specimen shows white on the 
head, tail, and wings, and others reported by "Mr. Adams show 
white on the wings. 
4 4 As before said, I believe the bird to be a geographical varia- 
tion of A. herodias , residing permanently and breeding in South 
Florida. I think that further search and observation will develop 
more evidence concerning A. occidentalis and A. wurdemanni , 
which may result in confirming your theory of their being one 
and the same species. You will pardon my opposing your opin- 
ion, but my convictions are so strong that only the finding of 
white birds with blue young and more cases of blue parents 
with white young, or adults showing mixtures of both phases, 
would overcome them.” 
Assuming that the large white birds observed by Mr. Ward 
were really a white phase of the dark-colored birds obtained by 
him, and which were so numerous in the locality, it certainly ap- 
pears strange that so few of the former were seen. The case of 
the Reddish Egret, which he cites, affords, however, an exact 
parallel, and it is now considered established beyond question 
that 44 Peale’s Egret” ( Ardea pealei Bonap. — a pure white bird) 
