iS9i-] SiiUFELDT Oil Fossil North Aiiier/ccii/ Hirds. \^^
the fiiht or second year, No. 11284, wliich differs from the bird of Feb. 9
(No. 1 1000) in having the black of the head broken by mottled bars of
black and chestnut, one above and one below the eye, nnd has no white
patch in the angle of the lower mandible. The black of the head is not
so intense as in No. iiooo. This bird was shot in a shallow pond just
above the house where I had not been for some days. A boy told me
there were at least three small Ducks in this pond and he thought four.
He had seen them two or three times in the last few days. On going to the
pond, one end of which has a dense growth of rushes, two Ducks were
seen, but only one killed, the other escaping wounded into the grass. The
testes of the bird taken were rather more than a quarter of an inch long
and an eighth of an inch in the smaller diameter. These little Ducks do
not seem at all rare on the Island, and have much the habits of the Grebes,
frequenting small fresh water ponds and depending rather on hiding in
the grass or diving than on flight to escape pursuit. They arc said by
the native gunners to breed at various points on the island.
39. Chen hyperborea (/'rt//.). Lesser Snow Goose.—"Accidental in
Jamaica." (Cory, Birds of the West Indies, p. 259.)
40. Branta canadensis {Li'i/n.^. Canada Goose.—"Recordeti from
Jamaica." (Cory, Birds of the West Indies, p. 260.)
41. Dendrocygna arborea (/./;/«.). Black-bellied Whistling Duck.
—Said to be common at points on the island and to breed in the man-
grove swamps. TGosse, Birds of Jamaica, pp- 395-399-)
42. Dendrocygna autumnalis {Li'in/.). Black-bellied Tree Duck.—
"The Red-billed Whistling Duck {D. autumnalis') though much less com-
mon in Jamaica than the preceding {D. arhorca) is found there in some
seasons as an autumnal visitant from the Spanish- Main." (Gosse, Birds
of Jamaica, p. 398.)
43. Phcenicopterus ruber Litni. American Flamingo. Red Flam-
ingo.—The visits of F'iamingoes to the coast of Jamaica are now very rare,
and, so far as I was able to ascertain, none breed at present on the island.
Formerly the visits of these birds seem to have been of regular occur-
rence.
\^To be continued
.^
TERTIARY FOSSILS OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS.
BY R. W. SIIUFELDT, M. D.
Upon examining a collection of fossil birds from the Silver
Lake Region of Southwestern Oregon, reccntl}^ submitted to me
by Professors E. D. Cope and Thomas Condon for description,
16
056 Siil'FKr.nr 0)i Foss/7 Xorf// Aincricti/i h'/n/s. |()ctol>ir
I have l)ceu enable! to uleutify li}l;\-oiie (51) species, thirteen
(13) of which I Hnd to be new to science. Out of tliesc llfty-one
species Professor Cope had on a former occasion pubhshed ac-
counts of ten of thcni—two of which were new—in addition to the
thirteen the j^resent writer has been enabled to describe. Among
other places, those described by Professor Cope appeared in an
article contributed by him to the 'American Naturalist' in
November, 1SS9, and so will not be especially dv\elt upon here.
Abundant remains o'i ^^chmophoms occidcntalis occur in this
remarkable collection of some 1500 specimens, and to a lesser
degree' do we find the fossil bones of Colymbus holbcelli^ C.
aiiritits (.?), C. nigricollis caUfornic7is^'A\-\i\ Podilyinbus podi-
ccps. Thus far, it is strange to say, no remains of any species of
Loons have been met with, nor any large extinct Divers allied
to them. Nor were any of the Alcidce discovered. This is a
significant fact, which to the student of the migration of animals
during tertiary time, may prove interesting.
Gulls apparently were abundant, and I have been enabled to
identify Larus anyentatits sinithsnnianus^ Lams Philadelphia^
Xema sabinii, and another which was most probably L. cali-
fornictis. There were at least two extinct Gulls, and they were
of moderate size, and probably niit very uidike existing forms^
which I have named Larus robustus and Lams orcgonus.
The list of Laridce is completed by Sterna elegans (.?),
Sterna forstcri (.?), and Hydrochclidon irigra surinatneiisis.
Steganopodes appear to be limited to that big Comorant already
described by Cope, the Phalacrocorax macropns^ and to the prob-
able occurrence of the Pelican, Pelecanus erythrorhynchiis^ oi
which I found only a part of an ulna in the collection, not quite
enough in my opinion to absolutely prove its existence in the
geological horizon under consideration. Nevertheless the bone
belonged to a Pelican, which was not fusca^ and as the other
species is abundant on those Oregon Lakes at the present writing
it was most likely the other species, that is, P. erythrorhynchus
.
As they are today. Ducks, Geese, and Swans were very plenti-
ful, and with Init one or two exceptions they are all identical with
existing species. I found more or less abundant fossil remains of
Lophodytes cnciillatns^ Anas boschas^ A. americana^ A. carol-
itiensis^ andyl. discors^ and the remains of another Teal which I
believe to be A//as cyanoptcra. Spatula clypcata was a very
iSi)i.| SiiUKELUi III! Fossil North Aincyicaii Birds. 3 7
ahiiiulaiit Duck, and Dafila acuta was also tbuiul, as well as
Aix spoiisa., AvtJiya luarila nearctica{?)^ Glaucioiictta island-
tea, and Clangitla hycmalls. There was an enormous Goose
which I have named Aiiscr co)iiioni^ in honor of Professor
Thomas Condon of the University of Ore^^-on, who was the first
naturalist to discover any fossil remains of birds in that region.
A}iscr condoiii wiX'a a species as large again as the Canada Goose,
prohablv exceeding it in size, as much as the Canada Goose ex-
ceeds in size one of our smallest Brant. There was Branta
Jiypsibatus ol Qo'^Q^ and a new Brant which 1 have called Bi-aiita
propluqiia. Many fossil bones also occur of B. canadensis^
Anscr albifro7is gaiubcli^ Chen hyperhorca^ and the .Swan des-
cribed by Cope, or Olor paloregonits. In all an exceptionally
fine series o'ifossil Anserine birds.
Of the various discoveries made none are more interesting than
the fossil remains of a new species of Flamingo,—a form now ex-
tinct. Judging from its bones, this species was somewhat longer
limbed than P. ruber ^ but not so robust as it in the body. I have
named it PJuviiicoptcriis copei^ in honor of Professor E. D. Cope
of Philadelphia.
A small Heron was also discovered, extinct as well as new, which
I have called Ardca paloccidentalis. Its remains are b\' no means
plentiful. There were also two Coots, our common form, the
Fulica americana^ and a new extinct, smaller one, which I have
designated as Fnlica luiuor.
Among the Limicoke I found the fossil bones of Phalaropus
lubatus, and it has proved to be the only shore bird thus far dis-
covered by the collectors. GallinEe, however, were abundant,
and rich, apparently, in species. Beautiful fossil bones of Tyiii-
panucJius pallidicinctus, as well as Pedioccetes p. coluiubianus
were readily recognized in the collection.
In addition to these was a larger and stouter Pcdiocccics, which
I have dedicated to my friend Mi'. F. A. Lucas of the U. S.
National Museum, and called it Pedioccetes lucasi; but there was
also a much smaller type, likewise extinct, and new to science,
which I have named Pedioccetes nanus. Finally, we have an
entirely new genus, which I have created to contain the tlnis far
sole species representing it. This species was a large Grouse to
which I have given the name of Palcotetrix g/l/i., in honor of
Dr. Theo. Gill (jf the .Smithsonian Institution.
^68 SiU'FiiLDT on Fossil North Aiiuricini Birds. |OcU)bui
Fossil bones of two extinct Eagles were also found in the col-
lection. One of tliese, which I have called Aqulla pliogryps^
appeared to have been a large species of slender build, and may
have had rather the habits of an active Falcon than those of the
more sluggish Eagles, such as the common white-headed one for
example. The other extinct form I have called Aqtiila sodalts,
and it was a smaller form than Aqnila pliogryps^ being more
nearly affined to our existing types,
—
perhaps to such a species as
tiie Golden Eagle for example.
Bubo virgbiiiDuts^ among the Striges, is represented liy an
almost perfect specimen of the carpo-metacarpus and a toe-joint.
The former is identical in character in all particulars with the
corresponding bone in a skeleton of B. v. siibarcticus with
which I have compared it.
Remains of Passeres were not abundant in the collection, and
1 found but two extinct species, both of which are new to science.
They were a Blackbird and a Raven. These I have designated
respectively as Scolecophagus affinis undCorvi/s amzectens. The
last named was a Raven considerably smaller than anv of our
present day Ravens as found in the avifauna of the ITnited States.
When piinted, my memoir describing this very valuable collec-
tion will make some seventy-five quarto pages, and be illustrated
by figures on stone of all the fossil bones of the new or otherwise
interesting forms.
The work will of course take into consideration a great deal
which will be impossible to set forth here, as the present paper
])retends to nothing more than a notice of the collection as a
whole. What I have given, however, will be sufficient for the
thoughtful student in ornithology to gain some idea of the avifauna
as far back as the Pliocene, in so far as what is now called South-
western Oregon, was concerned. It will be observed that even in
that horizon many of the species were identical with those now
existing, and in the case of the extinct ones, they were forms that
in the majority of instances, would not be out of place even in our
present day avifauna, belonging as they did in most instances to
modern genera and groups.