Early Fall Records of the Marsh Hawk in Alabama

Abstract

The Marsh Hawk in the North Carolina Mountains.-In 'The Birds of North Carolina,' by Messrs, Brimley and Pearson, the range of the Marsh Hawk (Circus hudsonius) is given as whole state east of the mountains in winter; otherwise recorded by Cairns as an uncommon fall transient in the mountains of Buncombe County, and by Coues as a common resident near Beaufort, on the coast. Though no definite elevations are given by Cairns for Buncombe County in regard to the observance of this species, his statement that it is uncommon coincides with the writer's experience, although rare would be more applicable for, after some fifteen years of study of the summer and fall birds of the mountain region, I have observed the Marsh Hawk on but one occasion on August 20, 1931, at Blowing Rock, Watauga County, at an elevation of 4000 feet. Four days later, on the 24th, Miss Mary L. Vardell, saw a Marsh Hawk over the golf links of the Green Park Hotel, about two miles and a half in an airline from Cone's Lake. In view of the fact that the species seems never to have been observed about Blowing Rock previously, it is highly probable that the same bird was seen on both occasions. Though often spending much, or all, of September in Buncombe County, at an elevation of about 2500 feet, the writer has never seen Circus hudsonius in that section. The line of migration evidently passes some distance to the eastward.-ALEXANDER SPRUNT, JR., 92 South Battery, Charleston, S. C.