A History of North American Birds, Land Birds. Volume 1. Robert Ridgway
on Baird
A History of North American Birds / Land Birds – Volume 1
PREFACE
The present work is designed to meet the want, which has long been felt, of a descriptive account of the Birds of North America, with notices of their geographical distribution, habits, methods of nesting, character of eggs, their popular nomenclature, and other points connected with their life history.
For many years past the only systematic treatises bearing upon this subject have been “The American Ornithology” of Alexander Wilson, finished by that author in 1814, and brought down to the date of 1827 by George Ord; the “Ornithological Biography” of Audubon, bearing date of 1838, with a second edition, “Birds of America,” embracing a little more of detail, and completed in 1844; and “A Manual of the Ornithology of the United States and Canada,” by Nuttall, of which a first edition was published in 1832 and a second in 1840. Since then no work relating to American Ornithology, of a biographical nature, has been presented to the public, with the exception of some of limited extent, such as those of Giraud, on the “Birds of Long Island,” in 1844; De Kay’s “Birds of New York,” 1844; Samuels’s “Ornithology and Oölogy of New England,” 1868, and a few others; together with quite a number of minor papers on the birds of particular localities, of greater or less moment, chiefly published in periodicals and the Proceedings of Societies. The reports of many of the government exploring parties also contain valuable data, especially those of Dr. Newberry, Dr. Heermann, Dr. J. G. Cooper, Dr. Suckley, Dr. Kennerly, and others.
More recently (in 1870) Professor Whitney, Chief of the Geological Survey of California, has published a very important volume on the ornithology of the entire west coast of North America, written by Dr. J. G. Cooper, and containing much original detail in reference to the habits of the western species. This is by far the most valuable contribution to the biography of American birds that has appeared since the time of Audubon, and, with its typographical beauty and numerous and excellent illustrations, all on wood and many of them colored, constitutes one of the most noteworthy publications in American Zoölogy.
Up to the time of the appearance of the work of Audubon, nearly all that was known of the great region of the United States west of the Missouri River was the result of the journey of Lewis and Clark up the Missouri and across to the Pacific Coast, and that of John K. Townsend and Mr. Nuttall, both of whom made some collections and brought back notices of the country, which, however, they were unable to explore to any great extent. The entire region of Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, and California was unvisited, as also a great portion of territory north of the United States boundary, including British Columbia and Alaska.
A work by Sir John Richardson, forming a volume in his series of “Fauna Boreali-Americana,” in reference to the ornithology of the region covered by the Hudson Bay Company’s operations, was published in 1831, and has been much used by Mr. Audubon, but embraces little or nothing of the great breeding-grounds of the water birds in the neighborhood of the Great Slave and Bear Lakes, the Upper Yukon, and the shores of the Arctic coast.
It will thus be seen that a third of a century has elapsed since any attempt has been made to present a systematic history of the birds of North America.
The object of the present work is to give, in as concise a form as possible, an account of what is known of the birds, not only of the United States, but of the whole region of North America north of the boundary-line of Mexico, including Greenland, on the one side, and Alaska with its islands on the other. The published materials for such a history are so copious that it is a matter of surprise that they have not been sooner utilized, consisting, as they do, of numerous scattered biographies and reports of many government expeditions and private explorations. But the most productive source has been the great amount of manuscript contained in the archives of the Smithsonian Institution in the form of correspondence, elaborate reports, and the fieldnotes of collectors and travellers, the use of which, for the present work, has been liberally allowed by Professor Henry. By far the most important of these consist of notes made by the late Robert Kennicott in British America, and received from him and other gentlemen in the Hudson Bay Territory, who were brought into intimate relationship with the Smithsonian Institution through Mr. Kennicott’s efforts. Among them may be mentioned more especially Mr. R. MacFarlane, Mr. B. R. Ross, Mr. James Lockhart, Mr. Lawrence Clark, Mr. Strachan Jones, and others, whose names will appear in the course of the work. The especial value of the communications received from these gentlemen lies in the fact that they resided for a long time in a region to which a large proportion of the rapacious and water birds of North America resort during the summer for incubation, and which until recently has been sealed to explorers.
Equally serviceable has been the information received from the region of the Yukon River and Alaska generally, including the Aleutian Islands, as supplied by Messrs. Robert Kennicott, William H. Dall, Henry M. Bannister, Henry W. Elliott, and others.
It should be understood that the remarks as to the absence of general works on American Ornithology, since the time of Audubon, apply only to the life history of the species, as, in 1858, one of the authors of the present work published a systematic account of the birds of North America, constituting Vol. IX. of the series of Pacific Railroad Reports; while from the pen of Dr. Elliott Coues, a well-known and eminent ornithologist, appeared in 1872 a comprehensive volume, entitled “A Key to North American Birds,” containing descriptions of the species and higher groups.
The technical, or descriptive, matter of the present work has been prepared by Messrs. Baird and Ridgway, that relating to the Raptores entirely by Mr. Ridgway; and all the accounts of the habits of the species are from the pen of Dr. Brewer. In addition to the matter supplied by these gentlemen, Professor Theodore N. Gill has furnished that portion of the Introduction defining the class of birds as compared with the other vertebrates; while to Dr. Coues is to be given the entire credit for the pages embracing the tables of the Orders and Families, as well as for the Glossary beginning on page 535 of Vol. III.
Nearly all the drawings of the full-length figures of birds contained in the work were made directly on the wood, by Mr. Edwin L. Sheppard, of Philadelphia, from original sketches taken from nature; while the heads were executed for the most part by Mr. Henry W. Elliott and Mr. Ridgway. Both series have been engraved by Mr. Hobart H. Nichols of Washington. The generic outlines were drawn by Anton L. Schönborn, and engraved by the peculiar process of Jewett, Chandler, & Co., of Buffalo. All of these, it is believed, speak for themselves, and require no other commendation.
A considerable portion of the illustrations were prepared, by the persons mentioned above, for the Reports of the Geological Survey of California, and published in the volume on Ornithology. To Professor Whitney, Chief of the Survey, acknowledgments are due for the privilege of including many of them in the present History of North American Birds, and also for the Explanation of Terms, page 526 of Vol. III.
A few cuts, drawn by Wolf and engraved by Whymper, first published in “British Birds in their Haunts,” and credited in their proper places, were kindly furnished by the London Society for the Diffusion of Christian Knowledge; and some others prepared for an unpublished volume by Dr. Blasius, on the Birds of Germany, were obtained from Messrs. Vieweg and Son, of Braunschweig.
The volume on the Water Birds is in an advanced state of preparation, and will be published with the least possible delay.
Smithsonian Institution, Washington,
January 8, 1874.
INTRODUCTION
The class of Birds (Aves), as represented in the present age of the world, is composed of very many species, closely related among themselves and distinguished by numerous characters common to all. For the purposes of the present work it is hardly necessary to attempt the definition of what constitutes a bird, the veriest tyro being able to decide as to the fact in regard to any North American animal. Nevertheless, for the sake of greater completeness, we may say that, compared with other classes,1 Birds are abranchiate vertebrates, with a brain filling the cranial cavity, the cerebral portion of which is moderately well developed, the corpora striata connected by a small anterior commissure (no corpus callosum developed), prosencephalic
We are indebted to Professor Theodore N. Gill for the present account of the characteristics of the class of Birds as distinguished from other vertebrates, pages XI-XV.