494 
BIRDS OF NEW MEXICO 
bers of them were seen by Mr. Gaut in the Jicarilla Mountains gathered 
with a party of Turkey Vultures about the remains of a cow, and Mr. 
Ligon says they are almost equal to the vultures as scavengers, eating 
coyote as well as any other carcasses. Along the public roads where 
people camp, he says they keep watch and when the campers leave, 
visit the ground and clean up the waste—a humiliating comment on the 
slovenly habits of many of the traveling public. One of the birds 
which visited Major Bendire’s camp near Tucson came regularly to 
his kitchen tent to pick up food thrown to him, and once carried off 
a salmon croquette and “made a trench in the hard soil fully two and 
a half inches deep and about twice as long” in which he buried it, 
carefully replacing the earth and coy e ring it with a fresh chip, “possibly 
to mark it” (1895, p. 403). 
Additional Literature.—Bailey, F. M., Auk, XLI, 426-427, 1924.— Bailey, 
Vernon, Condor, V, 87-89, 1903.— Smith, A. P., Condor, X, 92, 1908.— Swarth, 
H, S., Birds of the Huachuca Mountains, Arizona, 32-33, 1904.— Torrey, Brad¬ 
ford, Nature’s Invitation, 211-214, 219-220, 221-223, 1904. 
WESTERN CROW: C6rvus brachyrhynchos hesperis Ridgway 
Plate 50 
Description. — Length: About 18.5-19.2 inches, wing 11.1-12.7, tail 6.4-7.8, 
bill 1.6-1.9, depth at base .6-.7, tarsus 2.1-2.4. Adults: Black plumage of body 
glossed with violet, more strongly on upperparts, wings and tail partly glossed with 
greenish blue; feathers of throat short, blended. Young: Feathers duller and 
browner. 
Range. —Largely resident in the western United States and southwestern 
Canada; from central British Columbia, Montana, North Dakota, and Wisconsin 
south to New Mexico, Arizona, and northwestern Lower California. 
State Records. —The Western Crow, which is common to the north and east of 
New Mexico, while it occurs and nests throughout the foothills in the northern part 
of the State is apparently nowhere common in the breeding season. [A pair, presum¬ 
ably with young, were seen 10 miles south of Taos; three were seen on the Santa 
Barbara on June 27, 1919, a family of five on the Pecos at 8,300 feet, July 19, 1919, 
and on the same day, one, 3 miles east of Glorieta at 7,500 feet. Nests were seen in 
Uraca Canyon, southwest of Cimarron, June 16, 1924. From June 18-21 the birds 
were met with quite commonly in the Sangre de Cristos and about Taos, and on 
June 22, about Chamita on the Rio Grande (Ligon). Nests have been found in the 
cottonwood groves along the watercourses in northern Santa Fe County—along the 
Pecos River near Valley Ranch, in Santa Fe Canyon, along the Nambe River, 
between Nambe Falls and Pojuaque, and along the Rio Grande near the San Juan 
and Santa Clara Indian pueblos. Fresh eggs are found the latter part of April 
(Jensen, 1922).] They are said to breed at 8,000 feet near Halls Peak (Barber); and 
both old birds and young-of-the-year were noted near Pecos July 3, 1903; near 
Glorieta at 7,000 feet, July 7-10, and thence during the remainder of the month along 
the Pecos to 7,600 feet. The following year old and young were seen together at 
about 7,400 feet in the neighborhood of Taos the second week in July (Bailey). 
(Several pairs were nesting at Lake Burford, May 23-June 19, 1918 (Wetmore).] 
In fall and winter they scarcely ascend above 8,000 feet or casually to 9,000 feet 
as in the Gallinas Mountains, October 5-11, 1904 (Bailey). [On January 18, 1920, a 
flock estimated at 500 was seen 14 miles north of Las Vegas, at 7,000 feet.] In fall 
