Lake oes es eblO NT MV BsU sisi eT LN 3 
Breeding Birds of Jackson Park 
By MARGARET M. NICE 
JACKSON PARK, located in Chicago on Lake Michigan between 56th and 
67th Streets and Stony Island Avenue, is a tract of 543 acres, a hundred 
of which are lagoons. Sixty years ago it consisted of swales and oak 
ridges, but was landscaped to serve as the site of the Columbian Exposition 
in 1893. Its chief trees are elms, cottonwoods, bur oaks, lindens, catalpas, 
willows, silver maples, white ash, crabapples and hawthorns. The largest 
lagoon has seven small islands thickly covered with high bush cranberry; 
these are inaccessible except by boat. Wooded Island, 2000 feet long by 
400 feet wide, has many great trees, some at least 70 years old, and is 
planted with many shrubs—bush honeysuckle, high bush cranberry, wahoo, 
ninebark, nannyberry and many others. 
In 1936 a bird sanctuary of 22 acres was set aside and fenced adjacent 
to this island, great thickets of berry-bearing bushes being planted and 
many waterfowl introduced, the most abundant being Canada geese and 
mallards. These became established and were a great attraction to 
visitors. In 1939-40 Dale Jenkins made a study of social hierarchy among 
the waterfowl, finding the pair of blue geese with young were the 
dominant individuals. After some years botulism developed, and in 1950 
the geese were removed and the sanctuary abandoned. 
“What is now known as Jackson Park,” wrote Benjamin Gault in 
1937, “before being landscaped the year or two preceding the World’s 
Fair of 1893, was another good locality in which to find birds.” I inquired 
of Mrs. Al Chase, Secretary of the Benjamin T. Gault Bird Club in Glen 
Ellyn, Illinois, whether any records of Mr. Gault’s trips in this area could 
be found among his papers, but she was unable to locate any. 
Almost all bird observers go to the park in spring for the migrants; 
a few visit it in the fall, but almost none have paid much attention to 
the nesting birds. Six ornithologists have kindly given me the benefit of 
their experiences in this area. Dr. Herbert L. Stoddard worked at the 
Field Museum, then located in Jackson Park, from 1913 to 1920. Mr. C. 
O. Decker and Dr. Alfred Lewy have kept some records from 1923 to 
the present. Mr. Seymour Levy banded birds and found many nests be- 
tween 1938 and 1941, while James and Marjorie Decker (1949) made 
many trips to the park from 1948 to 1950. We came to Chicago in 1936, 
but until recently kept only scattered notes of what we found in the park. 
In 1949 I made 31 trips there from June through August, in 1950, 38 
trips, but in 1951 only 18. 
The combined records of the seven of us have given what seems a 
fairly complete list of the birds that have nested here during the last 
40 years. 
List of Summer Birds of Jackson Park 
Key: ** = nest found. * = young recently out of nest seen. C. D. = 
Charles Decker. J. & M. D. = James and Marjorie Decker. S. L. = 
Seymour Levy. A. L. = Alfred Lewy. N. = M. M. Nice. H.S. = Herbert 
Stoddard. 
