THE CONDOR 
I VOL. V 
[My own experience agrees perfectly with that of Mr. Mailliard. During December, 1900, 
while at Monterey Bay I saw a Heermann Gull and many emaciated Brandt Cormorants which 
were dying a slow death, and only yesterday (Dec. 22, 1902) saw another during a short walk 
near the Point Pinos Light. On Laysan Island, Hawaiian Group, I saw a number of sickly birds 
among the seafowl, and found a ver}’ rare petrel in this condition. Mr. Scott’s rule does not 
obtain among mammals for beside the example offered by Mr. Mailliard, I found a large sea 
lion near Cypress Point which existed for days in a perfectly helpless and moribund con- 
dition until Professor Harold Heath and myself mercifully killed it. Dissection showed no 
internal injuries nor parasites, while the teeth rather pointed to old age. — W. K. F.] 
The Fall Migration of Oreortyx pictus plumiferus. — The fall migration of the 
mountain quail {Oreortyx pictus plumiferus) appears to be influenced but little by the food sup- 
ply or temperature in its summer habitat in the Sierras which it appears to leave because the 
proper time has arrived for its annual tramp down the west slope. The first flocks start about 
the first of September, or sometimes two or three days sooner. At Webber Lake after three cold 
cloudy davs, they began to move westward August 28, 1900. When they are migrating their 
whistle is frequently heard, and they do not seek cover for protection but follow a wagon road, 
railroad, travel in snow sheds, pass near dwellings, and seem to care but little for self preserva- 
tion. 
Several flocks used to come down to the foot of Stanfield Hill, Yuba County, which for 
eight years was my favorite shooting grounds, and there spend the winter. They would arrive 
about the middle of October. One year they did not corne at all, and I wondered if they could 
foretell the mildness or .severity of the coming winter, for that winter was a mild one, excepting 
that October was unusually cold and stormy. Their regularity in leaving the mountains without 
regard to food, temperature, or size of young has mystified me quite as much asAuthus peusilva?/- 
ieus, and other northern breeding birds which I found in southern Lower California. Why they 
should remain in the tropical climate of Cape San Lucas until the first of May and then 
depart for their northern breeding grounds at the same time when they start north from the 
much more northern Central California puzzled me, for there was no perceptible change in cli- 
matic conditions about the first of May, and indeed scarcely a change in them, at the Cape, dur- 
ing the two or three preceeding months. —L ym.\n Bjji.ding, Stockton, Cat. 
Do Quail, I/Ophortyx californicus vallicolus, Remove Their Fggs? — One evening 
last spring as men were mowing the meadow, I went out to look for quail nests. In all I located 
eight nests, containing from three to eleven eggs. The following morning I revisited the nests 
and was surprised to find that four were empty. 
Passing outside the field I flushed a quail from a nest containing six eggs which I recognized 
as a clutch (then of five) I had seen in the field the previous day. I am positive the.se were the 
same eggs as I could not mistake the peculiar marking of two of them. This second nest was 
fortv feet from the other and on slightly higher ground. Is this characteristic of the birds? If so, 
how do they remove the eggs?— Erxest .Ad.\m.s, Clipper Gap, Cat. 
Frozen Toes. — I shot a golden-crowned sparrow the other day near Palo Alto that shows a 
curious mutilation of the feet. The outer toe of each foot is thickened and gnarled so that the 
joints can hardly be distinguished. A stump of the bone or claw protrudes at the tip. The 
whole thing reminded me of the way chickens’ toes look after being frost-bitten. The sparrow, 
as shown bv the skull, was of a last years’ brood, and might have tarried in its northern home 
last fall until a hard freeze set in. I have seen similar scars on bird’s feet before, but I can’t just 
now remember what species. Perhaps someone can suggest a more reasonable explanation. — Jos- 
eph Grinneee. 
Food of Anna Hummingbird. — In December, 1901, I collected a female Anna humming- 
bird which had eaten thirty-two green tree-hoppers, one spider, one fly, apparently a Simulium, 
and other insect remains which could not be determined. — F. C. Ce.\rk, Napa, Cal. 
Wood Ibis in Southern California.— The wood ibis ( Tantalus loculator) is so rarely 
noted in .Southern California that a flock of twenty-five seen by Joseph Grinneil and myself from 
the train, on the margin of a tide flat one-half mile north of Oceanside, August 5, is of especial 
interest. This is the first time we have seen it on this coast and the records of other observers 
are few and far between. On August 15, Mr. G. H. Coffin shot one from a pair at Bixby, Los 
-Angeles Co., but not knowing of its rarity it found its waj' into the pot and proved “not very 
good eating.” I was able to identify it In- its head and wings. 
On -August 23, Mr. Coffin and T. L. Duque went out purpo.sely for the other one and were 
fortunatelv able to secure it. Through their kindness it reached me in good condition. It 
