ORNITHOLOGIST 
— AND — 
OOLOGLST. 
$1.00 per 
Antium. 
Joseph M. Wade, Editor and Publisber. 
Established, March, 1875. 
Single Copy, 
10 Cents. 
VOL. VII. 
NORWICH, CONN., APRIL, 1882. 
NO. 14. 
Clarke’s Crow. 
CAPT. CHAS. E. BENDIRE, U. S. A. 
Although the Clarke’s Crow or Nut¬ 
cracker {Picicorvus columbianus Ponap) 
is a widely distributed bird, being found 
in considerable numbers in all suitable lo¬ 
calities from the eastern slopes of the 
Rocky Mountains to the Sierra Nevadas on 
the west and from Sitka Alaska on the 
north to the mountainous portions of Ari¬ 
zona and New Mexico on the south, there 
are few birds found in oiar Avifauna about 
whose nesting habits we had less positive 
information, and whose eggs remained so 
long unrepresented in our larg'est collec¬ 
tions, by even a single specimen, till I was 
fortunate enough to obtain the nest and 
eggs of this species, in the Spiing of 187G, 
near Fort Harney, Oregon. 
It is now something like twelve years 
since I first became earnestly interested in 
Oology, and during these years I have 
taken many rare sets of eggs, not a few of 
these new to science, and I believe I can 
honestly say that I have no specimens in 
my collection which have cost me so much 
labor and searching to obtain them, than 
the eggs of this species have done. How¬ 
ever, at the same time, I felt more genuine 
gratification after finding them, and I was 
well repaid for all the labor ex 2 :)ended 
from the knowledge that these eggs had 
been especial desiderata and searched for 
many years unsuccessfully, till I had finally 
succeeded where many noted ornithologists 
had failed before me. 
I met with these birds for the first time 
during the early part of the Winter of ’74- 
75, near Fort Harney, Oregon, to which 
j30st I had been assigned to duty a short 
time previously, and well do I recollect 
even now the tramj) I had after the first 
specimen I secured. The bird was a com- 
jjlete stranger to me—I took it to be some 
new and undescribed woodiiecker—and I 
was determined to have it. The snow, by 
the way, was something like two feet deep, 
which made walking anything but 2 )leas- 
ant. The bird seemed to know exactly 
how far my gun would reach, and kept just 
far enough out of the way, leading me 
from tree to tree for fully two hours, till 
by a lucky chance I secured it with a snap 
shot while it was in the act of doubling on 
me. When I picked it ujj I still thoiight 
that I had secured quite a prize and fondly 
hoped it would jirove a new species, but 
after getting home, although wet and tired, 
it took me but a short time to locate the 
siiecimen and to find out that it was already 
well known, but that its eggs remained 
almost unknown, and I determined to dis¬ 
cover these at least, should the birds be 
found in the vicinity during the breeding 
season. 
For some reason not easily explained I 
had come to an almost i^iositive conclusion 
that Clarke’s Crow nested in hollow trees, 
and as they act in many resj^ects like cer¬ 
tain of our wood 2 :)eckers and frecpiented 
the junijier groves fully as much as the 
2 )ine timber this seemed jdausilde enough. 
The finding of several young birds of this 
species but a few days out of their nest on 
May 5, 1875, sitting on the l)ranches of a 
large juniper, in the trunk of which I 
found a cavity filled with rubbish, and 
