eu Seni i ane Listens Baker e ere Sceerar Spe ee CORNELL LAB of ORNITHOLOGY LIBRARY AT SAPSUCKER WOODS Illustration of Snowy Owl by Louis Agassiz Fuertes Us Aatad Memoirs of the Muttall Ornithological Club. No. IV. THE BIRDS OF THE CAMBRIDGE REGION OF MASSACHUSETTS. By WILLIAM BREWSTER. WITH FOUR PLATES AND THREE MAPS. CAMBRIDGE, MASS. PUBLISHED BY THE CLUB, JULY, 1906, Ora th 6&4 M RBS4b PREFACE. THE present Memoir was undertaken upwards of ten years ago at the request of the Nuttall Ornithological Club. For reasons which need not be mentioned here, its progress has been vexatiously slow, and — what is still more unfortunate — its completion at,the present time has been made possible only by the sacrifice of certain historical features contemplated in its original plan. Nevertheless, it is hoped that the paper will prove of use to the members of the Club, as well as to other persons especially interested in the ornithology of the Cambridge Region. No attempt has been made to give full life histories of the birds. On the contrary, I have abstained from saying anything about their habits, songs, etc., save in cases where some mention of these and kin- dred matters has seemed essential to a clearer understanding of the reasons governing the local occurrence or distribution of certain of the species, or desir- able for the purpose of rendering commonplace or otherwise tedious details more attractive. What I have had chiefly in mind has been to state as defi- nitely as possible the times and seasons when each species has been noted, the numbers in which it has occurred, at long past as well as in very recent times, and the precise character and, in some instances also, situation of its favorite local haunts. In addition to my own record books, covering upwards of forty years of more or less continuous observation, those of the Nuttall Ornithological Club, which extend as far back as 1873, have been freely consulted. Several of the members of the Club, as well as a few of my other ornithological friends, have also placed their personal field notes quite at my disposal. Among those to whom I am indebted for assistance of this and other kinds may be mentioned Mr. G. M. Allen, Mr. Outram Bangs, Mr. C. F. Batchelder, Mr. Harold Bow- ditch, Dr. A. P. Chadbourne, Mr. Walter Deane, Mr. Richard S. Eustis, Mr. Walter Faxon, Mr. William P. Hadley, Mr. John H. Hardy, Jr., Mr. Henry W. Henshaw, Mr. Ralph Hoffmann, Mr. W. A. Jeffries, Mr. F. H. Kennard, Mr. Charles R. Lamb, Mr. Oliver Ames Lothrop, Mr. C. J. Maynard, Mr. F. B. McKechnie, Miss Bertha T. Parker, Mr. H. M. Spelman, Dr. C. W. Townsend, Mr. Howard M. Turner, Dr. Walter Woodman, and others whose names appear in the following pages. & 3 t A. } 4 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. I am under especial obligations to Mr. C. F. Batchelder, who has given very much time and thought to the revision of the manuscript and proof, and to Mr. Walter Faxon and Mr. Samuel Henshaw, who have aided me most gener- ously with suggestions and advice. To Mr. Walter Deane my indebtedness is greater than I can well express. From the first his interest in every detail of the work has been sincere and unflagging, and his assistance and advice have been simply invaluable. The dates of arrival, departure, etc., which appear in the preliminary paragraphs, immediately under the headings of most of the species, have been compiled and arranged almost wholly by him. Their use is as follows : — Summer residents. The average dates of arrival and departure are inserted between the earliest spring and the latest autumn records. In the case: of birds which occasionally spend the winter (as the Catbird) the word ‘ winter’ is added after the average dates, and early and late dates are given only when there is no doubt that they relate to individual birds which had just arrived from the South or were about to return to it. Transient visitors, The average spring dates of arrival and departure are inserted between the earliest and the latest spring records. The same plan is used with the autumn dates. In the case of birds which occasionally pass the summer (as the Solitary Vireo) the word ‘summer’ is added after the average spring dates. In the same way, if a bird occasionally passes the winter (as the Rusty Blackbird), the word ‘winter’ is added after the average autumn dates. In all these cases early and late spring and autumn dates are used only when they certainly relate to migrating birds. Winter residents. The average dates of arrival and departure are inserted between the earliest autumn and the latest spring records. In the case of birds which occasionally pass the summer (as the Brown Creeper) the word ‘sum- mer’ is added after the average spring dates. In such cases late spring and early autumn dates are used only when they certainly relate to migrating birds. In some cases no records of dates much earlier or later than the average dates are available. Average dates are occasionally omitted when there are not enough records to warrant stating them. Additional dates are sometimes inserted when they are of especial interest. In a few instances the lack of a really early or a late date is supplied by one from a locality outside, but at no great distance from, the limits prescribed in this Memoir; in such cases, how- ever, the localities to which the dates relate are invariably mentioned. All dates are omitted in the brief preliminary paragraphs relating to species perma- nently resident or of but infrequent or irregular occurrence. The ‘nesting dates ’ immediately under the dates of ‘arrival, departure,’ etc., are intended to cover the period during which fi// ses of fresh eggs of the first BIRDS OF THE CAMBRIDGE REGION. 5 laying may be looked for in the Cambridge Region. These dates do not include, in all cases, the very earliest dates at which eggs have been found, nor has any attention been given to dates which may be assumed to relate to sets not of the first laying. In compiling the nesting dates I have frequently consulted notes relating to extralimital localities, but little or no consideration has been given to records which concern localities lying to the southward of Cambridge or distant from it more than twenty or thirty miles in any other direction. In the use of scientific names I have followed rigidly those adopted by the American Ornithologists’ Union’s Committee on Nomenclature, up to and includ- ing the Thirteenth Supplement to the A. O. U. Check-List, which was published in the Auk for July, 1904. In one case, however, that of the Arctic Horned Owl, I have used a name not yet passed upon by the Committee. While I do not think that a faunal paper, such as the present one, is an appropriate place for discussions of technical points of nomenclature, yet in the single instance above noted the circumstances seem to warrant the remarks which I have made on this intricate and peculiar case. All the A. O. U. English names also are used, and to them I have frequently added names in current local use (past or present) in or about Cambridge. I have included in their appropriate systematic order (1) birds which are known to have inhabited or visited the Cambridge Region in former times, but which no longer do so; (2) birds which have repeatedly occurred very near but not actually within its boundaries ; (3) birds which have been introduced by the direct agency of man; (4) birds which have been reported only on what appears to be insufficient or inconclusive evidence. In all these cases the fact that the particular species or subspecies is not considered entitled to a present place in the natural fauna of the Region, is made sufficiently clear by omitting the usual number before the name, as well as by enclosing the name and the accompany- ing text in brackets. My early training and experience have led me to believe that — with certain exceptions about to be specified — the occurrence of birds in localities or regions lying outside their known habitats should not be regarded as definitely estab- lished until actual specimens have been taken and afterwards determined by competent authorities. No doubt it is becoming more and more difficult to live up to this rule because of the ever increasing and, in the main, wholesome, popular feeling against the killing of birds for whatever purpose. Nevertheless I cannot admit that mere observation of living birds met with in localities where they do not properly belong, or where they have not been ascertained to occa- sionally appear, should often be considered as establishing anything more than possible or probable instances of occurrence — according to the weight and char- acter of the evidence. 6 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. Exceptions to the rule may and indeed s/ou/d be made in the cases of spe- cies which, like the Turkey Vulture, the Swallow-tailed Kite, and the Cardinal, are easily recognized at a distance and which are reported by persons known to have had previous familiarity with the birds in life. Sight identifications of spe- cies somewhat less distinctly characterized than those just mentioned, if made under favorable conditions by observers of long field experience and tried relia- bility, may also sometimes be accepted with entire confidence. But on no authority, however good, should a mere field observation of any bird that is really difficult to identify, be taken as establishing an important primal record. These principles, which, in my opinion, should govern the makers as well as compilers of all local records, were formerly endorsed, and also followed in the main, by most ornithologists. Of late they have been frequently disregarded, especially by the younger generations of bird lovers and students. I have endeavored to apply them consistently and firmly — yet at the same time toler- antly — in dealing with the records considered in the present paper. If some of my rulings appear arbitrary, it must be remembered that it is not always possible to explain the reasons which cause one to look askance at the testimony of cer- tain observers while accepting that of others with entire confidence. It goes without saying that personal considerations whether of friendship or the reverse — should never be allowed to influence the judgment of any writer on scientific subjects, but his personal knowledge of men and their methods not only does but sould exert such influence. Moreover there is often internal evidence in printed testimony. — perhaps no more tangible than that to be gained by what is called ‘reading between the lines ’ — that leads one irresistibly, and, as a rule, quite safely, to adopt conclusions which cannot always be logically justified or consistently explained. INTRODUCTION. Tue birds of the Cambridge Region have been studied longer and more continuously, as well as perhaps more carefully, than those of any other locality of similar extent in all America. As far back as 1832 they were intimately known to Nuttall, and during the following eight or ten years they became equally so to Samuel Cabot and his brother, J. Elliot Cabot. Henry Bryant is also said to have been rather deeply interested in them about this time and to have collected them in considerable numbers.1 Between 1842 and 1860 they received more or less attention from James Russell Lowell, Thomas M. Brewer, Wilson Flagg, and various successive members of the Harvard Natural History Society, while from 1861 or 1862 to the present day they have been constantly under the observation of an ever increasing number of ornithol- ogists. Thus we have knowledge of them extending back over a practically unbroken period of more than seventy years. This, although by no means com- plete at all points, is sufficient to enable us to trace some of the more important and interesting changes in the local distribution and abundance of many of the species — especially the larger ones — which have taken place during the period just indicated. Some of these changes have evidently resulted from the increase of human population and the various modifications in the physical character of the region wrought by the hand of man; others have apparently been due to the introduction and subsequent increase of the pernicious House Sparrows; still others have been brought about by influences not as yet fully understood. The published notes and records, although by no means unimportant, are compara- tively meager and rather widely scattered, for no book or paper dealing exclu- sively as well as extensively with the avifauna of the region has hitherto appeared. The manuscript matter, however, is exceptionally rich and valuable, 1 Henry Bryant was a classmate of J. Elliot Cabot’s at Harvard College and was graduated with him in 1840. Cabot, in his autobiography (J. Elliot Cabot [Autobiographical sketch], 1904) refers to Bryant in terms which indicate that the latter, during his college days, devoted much of his time to collecting birds in the immediate neighborhood of Cambridge. 8 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. for the field to which it relates has been exhaustively studied, especially during the past twenty-five years, by many good observers. The nearest approach to a list of the birds found about Cambridge is afforded, I believe, by the annotations which I furnished for Mr. Chapman’s ‘Handbook of Birds of Eastern North America.’1_ The region to which these notes relate was not defined by Mr. Chapman, nor can I now remember its pre- cise boundaries ; but it certainly included the seacoast in the neighborhood of Revere Beach and also, I think, localities as far inland as Wellesley and Weston, with Newton and perhaps one or two other towns lying on the south side of Charles River. Hence it covered an area considerably more extensive than that of the Cambridge Region treated in the present paper. I also take this oppor- tunity to say that the migration dates given, on my authority, by Mr. Chapman, were intended to indicate the wswa/ periods of occurrence, all exceptionally early or late dates being excluded. It is to be regretted that this was not explained in the ‘ Handbook,’ for I am told that the significance of the dates in question has been very generally misunderstood by the readers of Mr. Chapman’s excellent book. Writers on local ornithology usually restrict their chosen fields to districts included within established political boundaries, such as those of towns, counties, or states; to symmetrical areas enclosed by purely arbitrary lines, as Mr. Chap- man did in his ‘Birds found within Fifty Miles of New York City’; or to natural geographical areas, as islands, river valleys and the like. In dealing with the Cambridge Region in the present Memoir I have adopted a plan not dissimilar to the first of those just mentioned, although I have not hesitated to disregard political boundaries wherever natural or arbitrary ones were better suited to my general purpose. This in effect has been to treat of that territory (and no other) over which ornithologists and collectors, living in or very near Cambridge, have been accustomed to roam during excursions not exceeding a day in dura- tion, and made directly from their own homes. It must be confessed that this arrangement was originally dictated quite as much by sentiment as by practical or scientific considerations ; — nevertheless it has proved not unsatisfactory on the whole, despite the fact that it has led to some perplexities, and perhaps inconsistencies also. There has been no question as to the propriety of includ- ing the entire cities or towns of Cambridge, Watertown, Belmont (with its pretty little outlying village of Waverley), Arlington, Lexington, and practically the whole of Waltham. Weston and Lincoln have been excluded, partly because they are comparatively seldom visited by Cambridge ornithologists, and also because they have faunal affinities perceptibly, if but slightly, closer with the 1¥F, M. Chapman, Handbook of Birds of Eastern North America, 1895. BIRDS OF THE CAMBRIDGE REGION. 9 Concord River Valley than with the region to the eastward. For similar reasons it has seemed undesirable to take in more than the extreme western borders of Medford and the southern portions of Winchester, while the greater part of Somerville has been disregarded because it is too thickly settled to pos- sess any ornithological interest. The total area included is definitely bounded on the south by Charles River, on the southwest and west by Stony Brook and its principal tributary, Hobbs Brook. Beyond Hobbs Brook Reservoir the line follows the western border of Lexington northward, and the northern borders of that town and of Arlington southeastward and eastward to the Upper Mystic Pond. After curving around the northern end of this pond, where it takes in a small part of Winchester, the line runs nearly straight in a generally southeast- erly direction through the western portions of Medford and Somerville to Craigie Bridge, its starting point on Charles River. No land bird not definitely known nor credibly believed to have been found within the boundaries just named, has been given a numbered place in the list. With the waders and water-fowl, however, the ruling has been somewhat less strict. They are notoriously addicted to flying back and forth over their entire feeding grounds, especially just before alighting, and for this reason both sides of Charles River and the Back Bay Basin, with the bordering marshes, are con- sidered, in relation to these birds, as coming within the legitimate scope of the present paper. Of the physical characteristics of the Cambridge Region it may be well to say a few general, preliminary words in this connection. The region comprises roughly about fifty square miles. Its extreme eastern portions, situated between the Charles and Mystic Rivers in Cambridge and Somerville, and in the eastern parts of Belmont and Arlington, are for the most part nearly level and but slightly elevated above tide-water. This low-lying plain, most of which is now densely populated, is enclosed on every side by hills, and crossed from north to south by a chain of fresh-water ponds of which the most noteworthy are the Upper and the Lower Mystic, Spy, Little, Pout, Fresh, and Bird’s Ponds. To the westward the land rises rather gradually in the neighborhood of Mount Auburn and Fresh Pond, but very abruptly between the town centers of Arling- ton and Belmont where the plain is terminated by a wall-like ridge elevated in places to above three hundred feet and stretching northeast and southwest for a distance of two or three miles. Beyond this the country is thinly settled, extensively wooded, and everywhere broken and hilly. The principal elevations are Prospect Hill, Waltham (482 ft.), Bear Hill, Waltham (360 ft.), Arlington Heights, Arlington (380 ft.), Loring Hill, Lexington (360 ft.), and Wellington Hill, Belmont (310 ft.). Although well watered by brooks (most of which flow into either the Charles or the Mystic), the western portions of the Cambridge Io MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. Region contain only one natural pond of any size, viz., Sherman’s, Hardy’s or Mead’s Pond, as it is variously called, situated in the northern part of Wal- tham. On the extreme western border of this town there is, however, a large artificial reservoir which the City of Cambridge made a few years ago by dam- ming Hobbs Brook. Although most of Cambridge is now thickly covered with houses, it pos- sesses many more trees than it did forty or fifty years ago when the districts lying to the west and north of Harvard Square, in the direction of Mount Auburn, Fresh Pond, and Arlington, were largely occupied by grassy fields and pastures or by vacant lots awaiting sale for building purposes. As this open land was cut up into streets and house lots, trees and shrubbery were planted in somewhat unwise profusion, with the result that this portion of the city has come to be buried in foliage in summer. A corresponding change is taking place in Watertown where, however, there is, at present, more open ground than formerly, for the planted shade trees have not as yet made good the loss of woods and orchards that have been cut away. The western portions of Arling- ton and Belmont, the northern part of Waltham and nearly the whole of Lexing- ton, exclusive of its town center and that of East Lexington, have changed but little in my time. The land here is still very generally in the hands of the farmers, and the landscape, although devoid of striking or unusual features, is very pleasing by reason of its simple, rural beauty. On every hand untrimmed woods and thickets, neglected pastures sprinkled with cedars and barberry bushes, and natural grassy meadows traversed by brooks of’ undefiled water, border close on the cultivated fields and orchards. Many of the houses, as well as barns and other farm buildings, are of ancient and picturesque styles of architecture, the walls and fences are gray with age or with lichens, and the sides of the lanes,— with those of some of the less frequented public roads,— having been left largely to Nature’s wise ordering, are fringed with a profusion of luxuriant native trees and shrubs of various kinds or buried deep in graceful ferns. In short, most of the changes which man has wrought in the original character and contour of the country have been long since either obliterated or rendered positively pleasing by the softening and refining effects of time, while — largely through the same beneficent influences — the artificial objects in the landscape, with comparatively few exceptions, have become almost perfectly harmonized with their natural surroundings. But even this remote corner of the Cambridge Region is not likely to remain unspoiled for many years longer. Lines of trolley cars have already penetrated it from two directions, land spec- ulators are regarding it with hungry eyes, and the day cannot be far distant when it must share the fate that has already befallen so much of the once equally attractive country to the eastward. N. 0. C., Memotr IV. Piare II. 7 ~ \ ' 1 No Hon. B Pi a OS Bis | ae | - TS TONEHAM 4