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May, 1908 EDITORIAL NOTES 131 THE CONDOM, An Illustrated l?[agazine of Western Ornithology Published Bi-Monthly by the Cooper Ornithologi- cal Club of Californi? JOSEPH GRINNELL. Editor. P?s*,den? J. EUGENE LAW. Business Manager. Hollywood, Cal. WILLIAM L. FINLEY ? Associate Editors ROBERT B. K. OCKWELL J Hollywood, California: Published May 22, 1908 SUI?SCB, IPTION RATES One Dollar and Fifty Cents per Year in the United States Mexico, and U. S. Colonies, payable in advance Thirty Cents the single copy. One Dollar and Seventy-five Cents per Year in all other countries in the International Postal Union, Claims for missing or imperfect numbers should be made within thirty days of date of issue. Subscriptions should be sent to the Business Manager. M?nuscfipts and Exchanges should be sent to the Editor. Advertising Rates on application. EDITORIAL NOTES The present issue of THE CONDOR contains but one illustration. This will please certain of our constituents who deplore the expenditure of our resources in cuts ! But perhaps others of our readers will not be so well pleased. Pro- vided our contributors supply us with good il- lustrations we propose to continue them as a feature of our magazine. The matter, therefore, rests with those who are in a position tosupply the pictures. Wanted--someone to tonipile the 10-year In- dex for THE CONDOR. Remuneration, all the honor and satisfaction attendant upon the com- pletion of the undertaking. Anyone feeling equal to the task, by reason of available time ar/d inclination, correspond with the Editor. The leading article in Cassinia for 1907 is by WitDer Stone and narrates what has been learned in regard to the life and accomplish- merits of Adolphus L. Heermann, M.D. No one of the early field naturalists of California did more lasting work in ornithology than Heermann. His papers, appearing in the Jour- nal of the Philadelphia Academy, and in Vol- ume X of the Pacific Railroad Surveys, form our most reliable record of the ornis of the State at the period of his explorations, 1849 to 1854. It will pay every student of western birds to read Mr. Stone's biography of Ileer- illann. A new edition of Mrs. Bailey's Handbook of Birds of the Western United States is announced to appear early in the fall. Messrs. Finley and Bohlman left Portland May 1 to make an ornithological tourof Eastern Oregon. They go by auto, having adapted a machine to the carrying of a camp outfit. Their object is, of course, primarily bird photography. CONDOR readers may look forward to seeing so?ne of the results in future issues of our mag- azine. The Birds of 14lashing'ion, announced two years ago as having been undertaken by William Leon Dawson and J. H. Bowles, is reported to be well along towards completion. A lately in- corporated featrite, to be added to an "Imperial Edition, de grand Luxe' ', of the proposed work, will be 16 original water color paintings of Washington birds by Allan Brooks. The cost of this edition will be $350.00 per copy. The work of Allan Brooks is said by those compe- tent to judge to be unexcelled by that of any other bird artist in the world. We have just received a letter from Mr. Robert Ridgway, dated "San Jose, Costa Rica, April 25, 1908." The following excerpts are of general interest: "The projected trip to the Cerro Turubales was abandoned, and we went instead to Guayabo, at the eastern base of the Volcan Turrialba, and thence to the lecheria at the foot of the cinder zone. Here we spent three miserable days on account of the cold and constant rain. From the lecheria we ascended to the crater, the climb requiring 3 hours and 10 minutes of very hard work; the descent was made in 2 hours. On the summit ? found only one bird, Junco vulcani; but a little further down, in the chaparral, Selasphorusfiammula and a Thryorchilus were noted. In holes of one of the cliffs of the crater a colony of Yemi- proone zonaris were nesting, but how they man- aged to stand the sulphur fumes I cannot un- derstand. We got no specimens of this bird because, in the first place, the cliff was on the opposite and inaccessible side of the pit, a quar- ter to half a mile distant; and in the second place, any specimens shot (if that had been possible) would have dropped at least 1000 feet into the abyss where, of course, it would have been the sheerest folly to attempt to go. "We did fairly well at Guayabo, adding at least two species (and genera) to the Costa Rican list." Mr. Ridgway will shortly return to Washingtoh where he will resume work on the Birds of North and Middle ?tmerica. The 1908 Alexander Expedition to southeas- tern Alaska left San Francisco May 18 to be gone until October. The collectors in the party are Miss Alexander, Mr. Joseph Dixon and Mr. Edmnnd Heller. As in 1907 the object of the explorations will be the collection of mam- mals and birds, and information concerning their habits and distribution. The material obtained will be deposited in the new museum at Berkeley. The Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California was formally estab- lished March 23, 1907. As announced in the March issue of this magazine, this new institu- tion has been founded thru the generosity of