June, 1881.] 
AND OOLOGIST. 
31 
The Snow 0\^ 1 is a common winter I’es- 
iclent with us, there are a number of speci¬ 
mens in town, and some are seen every 
winter. 
March 1st, Crow Blackbirds ap 2 :)eared. 
7th, Fox Sjiarrows; 8th, Red-winged Black¬ 
birds; 11th, During the snow storm yes¬ 
terday the birds all disappeared; but 
where ? 21st, I had a near and full view 
of a flock of Fox Sparrows and heard 
them sing. Charming songsters. 28th, a 
Red-tailed Hawk j^lunged into a brush 
heap this morning, (probably in pursuit of 
game) and got entangled and stripj'ed the 
feathers from its wings about half the 
length of the quills. It was drawn out by 
a boy, from whom the Hawk escai)ed. I 
saw it afterwards flying just over the tops 
of the trees. It had a strange appearance 
in the air, and flew with apparent difficulty. 
How many more feathers could have been 
lost and still the Hawk been able to fly ? 
April 2d. Large numbers of Giills 
{Kittewakes) were in the river, floating 
along like ducks. Occasionally one would 
rise up and fly a short distance and sink 
down again into the water. This gull ajj- 
pears here in the fore part of Ai:)ril and 
dejiarts early in November. I never saw 
them in the water l)efore. 3d, Phoebe 
birds ajipeared in numbers this morning. 
4th, White-bellied swallows. 9th. Cow 
Birds and Wood Pewees came to-day. A 
few common snow l)irds still remain. 13th, 
Prof. Hutchinson shot two of Wilson’s 
Snipe, so says Mr. Rawson, who saw them. 
14th, Belted Kingfisher, toward evening. 
18th, Field Sparrows. 22d. the Brown 
Thresher aiq^eared to-daj. This is much 
earlier than usual. 25th, Chewinks, black 
and white Creepers and House Wrens 
cheered us with their jn-esence to-day, for 
the fii’st time this spring. 
May 1st. This evening I heard the wel¬ 
come voice of the Whip-poor-will near the 
house of Mr. Jeremiah Davis. His son 
told me he had heard it for two or three 
evenings previous. 2d. This moniing came 
the Cat-bird. White-eyed Vireo and Wood 
Thrush. 3d, Summer Yellow Bird and 
Baltimore Oriole. Mr. John Burroughs 
says that the Baltimore builds on the south 
and west sides of the tree. There are two 
or three within sight of me now, that are 
on the east side. It would seem that some 
members of the Thrush family (Robin, 
Wood Thrush, Cat-bird and Brown Thresh¬ 
er) sing later in the evening than any 
others of our songsters. They are often 
heard until it is quite dark. The Chipping 
Sjjarrow will break out at times in the 
night for a moment and then sink back to 
sleep again, but the song of this bird is 
substantially finished before dusk. 
July 25th. A boy brought me a yomig 
male Green Heron {Ardeavirescens) which 
he says he procured in the adjoining town 
of Preston, where it was probably hatched. 
Sept. 24th. Mr. Y^oung tells me he shot 
a Red-bellied Nut-hatch to-day. I have oc¬ 
casionally shot one of this species, but it 
is shy and with us a scarce bird. Some 
seasons I do not see a single specimen. 
The White-bellied Nut-hatch is very com¬ 
mon and a constant resident. 
Nov. 28th. The White-throated Spar¬ 
rows and Fox Sparrows linger yet. 
Mr. George Case, who is a carebil ob¬ 
server, told me that he saw on the 7th and 
9th of December flocks of 12 or 15 White¬ 
winged Cross-bills. 
Dec. 28th. Goldfinches are plentiful 
this winter. Mr. Case, who is a botanist, 
says they open the jjods of the Evening 
Primrose and extract the seeds; while 
the Tree Sparrow' {tSpizella monticola) 
shakes the stalk and in that w'ay detaches 
the seed from the pod. The Chicadee 
finds a grub in a kind of sack on the Gol¬ 
den rod which food it seems to enjoy huge¬ 
ly. There are more Shrikes in our town 
than usual this w'inter, even early in the 
season they were exceedingly abixndant. 
Pine Linnets somewdiat scarce. Y’ellow 
Crowned Kinglets (another of our winter 
residents),usually appear in Octcjber, about 
the middle, but this w'inter only in small 
numbers, as it appears to me. Song sjxar- 
