A Recent Turkey Vulture {Calharles aura seplentrionalis) in Maine, 
and Revision of Earlier Records. — On August 27, 1910, a Turkey Vul- 
ture was shot on Cape Elizabeth, Maine, and on the 30th it came into my 
hands. I was told that it swooped down among some chickens, and on 
the supposition that it was a hawk it was shot. It proved to be an adult 
female, with moult well advanced. It was rather fat, and with stomach 
nearly empty weighed about pounds, about two pounds less than the 
weight given by Audubon. It carried a No. 8 shot embedded and healed 
in the left ulna and had lost the distal joint of the middle toe of the left 
foot, and the next joint was stiff. 
This is apparently the fifth specimen to be taken and preserved in the 
State, though the number of accepted occurrences will now number nine. 
The statements of Josselyn, Pennant and Wilson cannot be regarded as 
affording any specific Maine records. The first appears in the Boardman 
and Verrill list of 1862, based upon a specimen taken near Calais.' 
The second is chronicled by Mr. Nathan Clifford Brown, in the ‘ Rod and 
Gun,’ December 15, 1874. This is the bird taken “ about the first of 
November ” that year in Standish, Cumberland County. Later compilers 
have accredited this to Mr. Everett Smith, who also recorded it.^ The 
‘ New England Bird Life,’ ® in quoting from Smith, as cited, dropped the 
name of the town (i. e., Standish) and the word “ County,” the record there 
appears as Cumberland, Maine, thus taking the aspect of another record, 
though fortunately the citations makes the case clear to anyone having 
access to the literature in the case. 
The third specimen, taken at Buxton about the last of December, 1876, 
is also recorded by Mr. Brown.' 
The fourth, taken at Denmark, Maine, March 15, 1883, by Mr. Abel 
Sanborn, has been the source of considerable confusion. Apparently this 
was first reported in the Lewiston ‘ Gazette,’ of April 20, 1883 {fide Gushee), 
and what evidently is a clipping of this article is published by A. R. Gushee 
in ‘ Forest and Stream,’ April 26, 1883.* The place is not stated, though 
the capture is accredited to Abel Sanborn of East Fryeburg. In the same 
journal for May 10, Everett Smith presents the same record, giving the 
date of capture as March 15, 1883, East Fryeburg.® In 1898 Mr. James 
C. Mead corrected the place of capture, so the record should stand, Den- 
mark,' Maine, March 15, 1883. 
In the ‘ List of the birds of Maine ’ by O. W. Knight, this last bird ap- 
pears under both, the Turkey Buzzard (Gushee) * and Black Vulture 
(Smith) 
1 Proc. Boston Soc. N. H., IX, 122. 
“ Forest & Stream, III, 324 (Dec. 31, 1874). 
> Vol. II, 137. 
‘ Proc. Portland Soc. N. H., II, 23. 
» Vol. XX, 245. 
® Ibid., 285. 
7 Maine Sportsman, July, 1898, p. 13. 
8 Bull. 3, Univ. of Maine, 57. 
® Ibid., 58. 
Auk 
Black Vulture in Vermont. — On July 7, 1912, a Black Vulture 
(Catharista urubu) was shot in Pawlet, Vt., a town adjoining this but just 
across the New York line. It was brought to me for identification and is 
being mounted by a local taxidermist. It seemed to be an old bird in fine 
plumage and the wonder is that it should be taken several hundred miles 
north of its summer home. — F. T. Pembbe, Granville, N. Y. 
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