40 
BIRDS OF COLORADO. 
THE HISTORY OF COLORADO ORNITHOLOGY. 
In an old State like Massachusetts or New York whose 
birds have been studied and written about for nearly two cen- 
turies, it would be almost a hopeless task to collect and digest 
the enormous mass of material. In Colorado the case is far 
different. Less than fifty years have elapsed since the first sys- 
tematic study of Colorado birds was made and but little was 
done previous to 1870. Yet in twenty-five years many records 
have been lost and the Colorado list shows already nearly a 
dozen species known to have been taken in the State, but the 
data of whose capture, when, where and by whom, cannot now 
be found. 
This shows that it is high time a permanent record should 
be made of the principal facts in Colorado Ornithology while 
these facts are obtainable. 
1807. Pike. The first reference to any birds residing in 
Colorado is found in Lieut. Pike’s account of his trip through 
the State. He mentions the raven, magpie, turkey and pheas- 
ant. From what is now known it seems probable that he refers 
to corvus corax sinuatus^ pica pica hudsonica^ meleagris gallo- 
pavo and de^idragapiis obscurus^ but as this is guess work in the 
case of two of these species, all of them are repeated under 
the name of the next one who reported them. 
1823. expedition of Maj. Long was accompanied 
by the first trained ornithologist, who entered the bounds of the 
present State of Colorado. Thos. Say has left us records of the 
capture during that trip of dendragapus obscurus^ columba fasci- 
ata^ • tyra 7 i 7 ms verticalis^ pica pica hudsonica^ carpodacus mexi- 
canus frontalis^ spinus psaltria^ passerina amoena^ petrochelidon 
lunifrons^ mimus polyglottos^ salpinctes obsoletus and merula 
migratoria. 
1858. Baird. The government parties of the Pacific Rail- 
road surveys traveled but little in Colorado. The following is 
a list of all the government expeditions that entered Colorado 
previous to i860: 
1806-7. Lieut. Pike. Up the Arkansas River to Canon City, across into 
South Park ; then by a round-about way into the San Luis Valley and to New 
Mexico. 
