Page:Condor19(6).djvu/12

186 Ixobrychus exilis. Least Bittern. Sitta canadensis. Red-breasted Nuthatch. These two species were noted by me in Golden Gate Park on May 12. Both were reported to me by competent observers several times after I noted them, and it seems possible that they spent the summer there.

Planesticus migratorius propinquus. Western Robin. It is not very long ago that the first robin's nest was discovered in Golden Gate Park. This year the birds seemed to me to be more abundant than ever. They are also nesting in San Mateo County at Mount Olivet Cemetery, and on the eastern side of the bay near Berkeley. I noted them carrying food at the cemetery on July 15; and Mrs. Amelia S. Allen reports them from the Berkeley station.

Phalacrocorax auritus albociliatus. Farallon Cormorant.

Phalacrocorax penicillatus. Brandt Cormorant.

Mr. W. Leon Dawson some years ago reported Farallon Cormorants as nesting in large numbers on the Seal Rocks, where they seem never to have been noted previously. On July 15 I examined the birds on these rocks very carefully with a telescope magnifying twenty diameters. There were several hundred cormorants on the rocks and a good many of them were nesting. The nests could be plainly seen and birds were also seen carrying nesting material to the rocks. Dawson mentioned only Farallon Cormorants, but of those I examined about a third were Brandt Cormorants.

Amphispiza belli. Bell Sparrow. On June 2 I found a pair of Bell Sparrows nesting on the east slope of Mount Tamalpais, west of Larkspur. There were several young just leaving the nest and hardly able to fly. The species has been' noted in the county near Nicasio but is apparently nowhere very common.

Hylocichla guttara slevini. Monterey Hermit Thrush. On June 10 I noted a few Monterey Hermit Thrushes on the eastern slope of Bolinas Ridge. The locality is rather dense forest, and in condition approaches Boreal. The time of year and the surroundings are such as strongly to suggest that these thrushes, with so disconnected a breeding range, have one of their nesting colonies in western Marin County.

Circus hudsonius. Marsh Hawk. In July, 1915, I noted a number of Marsh Hawks on Point Reyes Peninsula and suspected that they were nesting there as some of the birds seen seemed to be in juvenile plumage. On June 20 of the present year I found a nest about two miles from Point Reyes Light House. The nest was composed of grass and contained five eggs rather advanced in incubation. I believe that this is the first breeding record for Marin County and for the whole humid coast region.—, San Francisco, California, September 15, 1917.

Condition of Game Birds in East-central California.—During two months of the past (1917) summer, and six weeks of the same season in 1914, I was engaged in field work at various points in western Mono County. As last winter was a hard one for all forms of mountain life because of the severe and long-continued cold, and as there are now many more hunters in the district each fall than there were three years ago, it seems to be worth while to report upon the apparent condition of the game birds of the district.

Most of my time during both years was spent at points between eight and nine thousand feet in altitude, which was an excellent location for both quail (Oreortyx p. plumifera) and grouse (Dendragapus o. sierrae). In 1914, both species were well represented, and although by no means common, especially the latter, both were apt to be encountered during a walk of a couple of miles through their haunts. In 1917, throughout a greater length of time, and during rambles that were of considerably greater extent, I saw neither quail nor grouse; nor did anyone who was camped in our near vicinity, except my brother-in-law, who met a small family of grouse one day. This present scarcity I believe to be due more to the severe winter than to human agencies, for both birds make decidedly hard hunting. Although most of the published information pertaining to the Sierra Grouse gives one the impression that these birds haunt the pines and associations of scant undergrowth, my experience has been that they seldom resort to the larger conifers except to roost, and to escape their enemies by remaining motionless in the upper branches. At least in the locality under consideration, their favorite habitat is in the vicinity of dense aspen thickets, and the tangles of manzanita, hazel and other brush on the dry hillsides and benches of the high Transition Zone, from which they flush to the timbered ravines. Such is the favorite haunt of the quail as well. Even with hunters