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MAR., ?9o2. I THE CONDOR 37 In some respects the Oregon song' sparrow is a remarkable form. It is darker than the races north and south of its range, and duplicates in coloring the sooty song sparrow of the Sitkan District. The races along the coast seem thus to alternate light and dark. But while fiha?a is nearly identical with rufina in color, it is conspicuously smaller, and the ranges of the two are separated by several hundred miles. The present form occupies a strip along the coast from the northern limit of the redwoods (?) or at least from Rogue River north to Yaquina. The specimens from Crescent City are probably migrants as the breeding birds seem nearer cleonensis (tho not precisely typical). The area ot? intergradation between cleohen- sis and phwa is probably small, extending perhaps from Crescent City to Chetco R. (northern limit of Sequoia sempervirens). Lack of specimens prevents the exact determination of the limits ofph?ea at the north. I am indebted to Mr. Robert Ridgway and to Dr. C. Hart Merriam forthe use of specimens and types in the collection of the National Museum and in that of the Biological Survey. Winter Observations on the Colorado Desert. F. S. DAGGETT, ROM Oct. 27 to Nov. ?6, ?9o?, I spent at the American Girl Gold Mining Co.'s camp, located in the Cargo Murchacho Mts on the Colorado Desert, five and one-half miles north- east of Ogilby, Cal., and some sixteen miles west of Yuma, on the Colorado River. The westward trend of the river below Yuma, however, brings the stream within eleven miles of camp to the southeast. From a bird standpoint, or any other, for that matter, it is a most uninviting spot. The camp is located in a dry gulch formed by ridges of barren rock north and south of it. At one time the wash at the ?ottom of the gulch sup- ported a few stunted palo verde, iron wood and mesquite trees, but they have long since been cut for fuel The only water obtained is from a pipe line reaching the Colorado River eleven miles away. The pipes are carefully watched for leakages so the birds have scant supply from that source, but a floating board in the reservoir at the end of the pipe line furnishes a possible watering place. I often saw them at the tub in the horse corral and about the seepage at the end of the kitchen drain. Another place, and a most deadly trap it proved judging from the PASADENA., CAL. dead birds floating on its surface, was the cyanide tanks, two in number, con- taining a strong solution of cyanide of potassium. Birds that essayed to quench their thirst at this fount top- pled over dead in an instant. When I arrived in camp I found sev- eral American pipits, three interme- diate sparrows (? 1. ?ambeli) and another variety of sparrow too soaked by solution for identification, besides many that rested on the bottom of the tank. The most common and the only resident bird, the rock wren, seemed to avoid this danger entirely, it being at- tractive only to thirsty migrants. That there is a migration across the desert is evident from the fact that such birds, as mentioned above, are found so far from their natural environment. A small horse and a larger mule corral, with its scattered hay, offers some at- traction for birds in the way of seeds and grain, but only once did I see them take advantage of it, when three juncos were seen on the ground near the baled hay at daylight one morning. There were about a dozen rock wrens (Salpinctes obsoletus) about camp. They were very tame in the vicinity of building, wood and lumber piles, but very wary and secretive among the