Mar., 1909 
NOTES ON THE CALIFORNIA BLACK RAIL 
49 
point, where I failed to flush it again. I happened to have a charge of heavy shot 
in the other barrel and let it go. This is the only long flight I have seen and it 
reminded me of the flight of a water ouzel. The other two flights I have seen were 
short and rail-like. 
Last November I was camped in the valley of the Tijuana River near the last 
monument of the boundary between California and Mexico. The lad before men- 
tioned staid with me a few days and was accompanied by his pointer dog. We 
hunted the marshes several high tides but found but one California Black Rail. 
This flushed close to the boy’s feet and was shot by him at very short range. He 
presented the skin to the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology and we now have three 
specimens there. The dog pointed several Clapper Rails ( Rallies levipes ) but 
failed to find the small species. 
From my own observations and such information as I have been able to ob- 
tain from others I think that the California Black Rails are resident in the salt 
marshes along the coast of southern California, at least as a species; there may be a 
short individual migration but that remains to be proven. The nesting is prob- 
ably early, March and April. Sets number four to eight, probably seldom the 
larger number. The nests are hidden in the Salicornia near the highest tide line, 
a few inches from the ground, and are often merely a few dead bits of Salicornia 
drawn together and tramped into place. It is practically impossible to make a 
positive identification unless it proves practicable to trap the parent at the nest. 
The birds seem to lie very close and must be nearly stepped on before they 
will flush. I fancy that the species will be found fairly common in many local- 
ities when they are looked for carefully in the right places. 
San Diego , California. 
AMONG THE THRASHERS IN ARIZONA 
By M. FRENCH GILMAN 
WITH ONE PHOTO BY THE AUTHOR 
T HE territory in which the following notes were made lies in the Pima Indian 
Reservation along the Gila River. Observations covered a strip of country 
about twelve miles long by three miles wide, lying along the south side of 
the Gila. My two bases of operation were Blackwater, an Indian village of 1362 
feet altitude, and Sacaton, where is located the Pima Agency and the Pima Train- 
ing School. Sacaton has an elevation of 1275 feet and the distance between it and 
Blackwater is about ten miles. 
Half a mile south of the Gila, and flowing parallel with it for about twenty 
miles is a small stream called the Little River. Along its banks are a few cotton- 
woods, many willows and much water-mote {Baccharis glutinosd) . Between the two 
streams, on the “Island,” as it is called, are groves of cottonwoods, and a few 
Arizona ash trees ( Fraxinus velutina) . In places not cleared and cultivated by 
the Indians, is a dense growth of mesquite {Pro sop is velutina ), screw-bean ( P . 
odorata ), and arrow-wood {Pluchea sericea) , besides a number of scattered plants 
of squaw-berry {Lycium berlandieri) and jujube {Zizyphus lycioidi.es). 
About three miles south of the Gila runs, parallel, a broken range of large 
hills or small mountains and on the intervening strip are many species of the cac- 
tus family: the sahuaro or Giant Cactus ( Cereus giganteus) , 20 to 35 feet high or 
