Page:Condor5(3).djvu/22

 MAY. x9o3] THE CONDOR 79 FROl FI!LD :AND STUDY Hawaiian Birds in the Crater of Kilauea.--While spending some days at the Volcano House last October making a survey and sketch model of Hawaii's famous volcano, 'ilauea, for the Bishop Museum, I was much interested to find that certain of the Hawaiian birds were utterly disregarding the power of nature and the presence of man and were to be found here in the very home of Madam Pele, the goddess of volcanoes. On the north side of the crater are a number of fault blocks of great size which descend step-like one after another, forming an easy descent to the floor of the crater. All of this locality is more or less thickly wooded chiefly with native Ohea. It was in this quiet retreat that the birds had taken up their abode. I noted during my stay the following species, all inside the crater preper. Phaethon lepturus was seen a number of times; on one occasion circling about over the pit of Halemaumau, where eight hundred feet be- low it was the burning lake of liquid lava. Buteo solitarius was seen on two occasions, and Chasiempis sandvicensis, Acrldotheres tristis (introduced), k'estiaria coccinea, IJimatione san- guinea, Chlorodrepanis virens, Oreornystis rnana, and Phceornis obscura were all seen on more than one occasion.--Wx. ALaNSON BRYt, N, Bishop Museum, Honolulu, H. [. Cnrions rait of hiek-billed Sparrow.--Many years ago I took a nest and four fresh eggs of the thick-billed sparrow (Passerella iliaca rnegarhyncha) from a bush of Ceanothus cor- dulatus and secreted it in a sparse growth of "mountain misery" (Charncebatia oliolosa) forty or fifty feet from where I had found it. In an hour or two I returned for the nest which I found, but the eggs were gone. I happened to see one of them two or three feet from the nest in a line with its former site, and following that line I found them all. One was directly under the place from which I had taken it, one was nearly there, and the other was not more than twenty feetStom it. I inferred that the parent birds had rolled them on the ground, which they could easily have done, as the course was free from any great obstacles, and was gradually descending.--Lx_N BELDING. Dendroica andnboni a Raisin lSater.--I have found a new trait in the Audubon war- bler which may be of interest to CONDOR readers, namely, a taste for szeets. There is a large amount of raisins on the trays stacked up in the tray shed of the packing house here and for sev- eral days they have been a great attraction to the birds, so much so that it has been necessary to keep a man constantly in attenadnce to shoot them and drive them away. The other morning I saw a flock of fully 200 birds--mostly Audubon warblers--around the shed and they seemed to go wild over the fruit, and as fast as they were driven from one side of the shed would fly round to the other. Every bird shot that I examined had the bill sticky for its whole length. The amount of damage done was considerable. Among the birds that had been killed I found one Arkansas kingbird, several bluebirds and house-finches, but the warblers were at the rate of about five to one of the other species. I do not know if this is a common trait of the Audubon warbler else- where, but it is certainly new to me.--C. S. SHARP, Esvonclicto, Cal. Concerning Spotted Eggs of the Lark Bunting.--I have had some inquiry lately for '"eggs of the lark bunting which are marked" and I would state: that from my register I find I am responsible for 47 sets and in the'lot there has been but two sels of spotted eggs. The marks are not many, nor very large, but sufficient to make a pretty effect. They are of a reddish brown and mostly about the larger end of the egg. Some eggs have a few spots scattered from end to end. There is also the "under markings" and a few wavy lines of color, "blackbird style." The spots zill not smear while cleaning the egg, and at this late date they vannot be scrubbed off with warm water and soap. One of these sets I am keeping from the sunlight in my cabinet, and the other is safe in the case of J. H. Flanagan, Providence, R.I. I have had nany eggs of the lark bunting and mountain bluebird, which could not be distinguished from each other.--FRED M. DILLE, Longrnont, Colo. Phe Wood Ibis Near San Bernardtno.--One afternoon in the early summer of I89I, a friend and myself came upon a flock of eight wood ibises ( 7antalus loulator) feeding in a damp field about midway between San Bernardino and Highland. They flew away at our approach and disappeared toward the northwest. On june 5, I9 2, Mr. Stanley Whirlock and I saw three 7anlalus loculator flying about in this same locality. We shot one for identification. Thence for about a month they became very numerous here, as many as twenty-two being seen in a single flock. They fed mostly in the creek bottoms, and occasionally a flock would be seen circling high in the air for a half-hour at the time. With the coming of July they gradually disappeared. These are the only wood ibises I have ever seen here, although I have lived here for many years.--J. B. FEUDGE, Highland, Cal.