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THE CONDOR 
Vol. XVI 
be accounted for by the fact that no distinction was made in the comparison 
of old and juvenile birds. 
It is difficult to tell the young from adults when the birds are in skin form, 
but in the flesh the difference is usually fairly apparent. In the adults of all 
geese the feathering of the neck is fuller, the knob on the carpus is more prom- 
inent, and the whole plumage has a distinct gloss seldom seen in the young 
l)ird. Could the tests of the measurement of culmen, and the comparative 
measurements of tarsus and middle toe, be applied to a series of geese where 
only young could be compared with young, and adults with adults, it is the 
writer’s belief, based on the handling of many geese in the flesh, that there 
would prove to be three distinct species — not subspecies — canadensis, liutchinsi. 
and minhna, with occidentalis as a subspecies of canadensis. 
If the four birds accepted as subspecies occupied distinct breeding ranges, 
impinging oidy on their boundaries, the theory of their specific identity might 
be a sound one, but in the case of canadensis, liutchinsi, and minima their 
breeding ranges overlap to such an extent that they cannot be treated as cli- 
matic subspecies. In the field minima seems to be a very distinct species; in 
flight the neck looks shorter and the wings longer in proportion than in any 
other goose, not even excepting the Brant. It also has an unique and peculiar 
cackling or chuckling cry, only rarely heard, in addition to the ordinary high 
pitched “honk”. Was this known to Mr. Ridgway when he gave it its com- 
mon name ? 
It is unfortunate that Mr. Swarth had to work on material, the bulk of 
which is from California. He has evidently not seen the breeding canadensis 
from the coast strip south of the breeding range of occidentalis. 
This is largely a non-migratory bird, nearly as dark as occidentalis, the 
under parts being dark gray-brown, but the measurements fully up to the 
maximum of B. canadensis canadensis. 
This bird the present writer long took to be occidentalis until specimens 
were carefully measured. The next problem was to identify occidentalis 
among the numbers of liutchinsi that he had a chance to examine. The con- 
clusion he was forced to was that as far as southern British Columbia was con- 
cerned occidentalis was a myth, even though so eminent an authority as Mr. 
Brewster identified skins sent to him as of that subspecies. The whole prob- 
lem is a very difficult one and much work remains to be done on the group, 
but Mr. Swarth ’s treatise should serve as a basis, a sort of causeway over a 
hitherto impassable morass. 
Okanagan Landing, British Columbia, January 2j, IQ14. 
THE BIRDS OF TETON AND NORTHERN LEWIS AND CLARK 
COUNTIES, MONTANA 
By ARETAS A. SAUNDERS 
WITH TEN PHOTOS BY THE AUTHOR 
T eton county lies in the northern half of Montana and considerably 
west of the center of the state, its northern border formed by the Cana- 
dian boundary, and its western by the continental divide. Although in 
tlic western half of Montana, its bird-life is more nearly like that of the east- 
