The yellow rail in the District of Columbia

Vol. 31,pp. 93-100 June29, 1918

PROCEEDINGS

OFTHE

BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON

GENERAL NOTES.

THE EARLIEST TECHNICAL NAME FOR THE PORTUGUESE IBEX

Recent authors have cited the

name _Capra

lusitanica from Franga, 1909(Bull. Soc. Portugaise^Sci.Nat.,^vol.2,p. 144),basedonthe descrip- tion ofthe "

Cabra-Montez da Serra do

Gerez"

of Bocage, ¹⁸⁵⁷

(Mem.

Acad. Sci. Lisboa, ser. 2,vol. _{2, pt. 1,} p. 1, pis. 1, 2). It isworthy ^of record thatthePortuguese Ibex wasgiven a valid technical

name

in 1872, thirty-sevenyears^earlierthan the generally accepted^date.

The

correct referenceis

Capra

^lusitanicaSchlegel,

De

Dierentuinvan hetKoninklijk ZoologischGenootschap Natura^ArtisMagistra^te

Amsterdam,

Zoogdieren, p. 96, 1872.

The

animalthere describedas differingfrom

Capra

pyrenaica

isthe ibexofthe mountainsof southern Spain

and

ofPortugal^; a

com-

posite of the

modern Capra

pyrenaica ^lusitanica Franca, C. p. ^victoria:

Cabrera,

and

C. p. hispanica Schimper.

The name may ^now

^berestricted

totheibex ofSerrado_Gerez,northern_Portugal

—

the

same

form_recently

named _Capra

lusitanica

by

^Franca; especially asSchlegel ⁱⁿ

an

earlier paper (Jaarboekje Koninklijk Zoologisch Genootschap Natura Artis Magistra, 1857, p. 161), where the

name

is a

nomen nudum,

says that ^it has been _applied to the Portuguese ^ibex

("Men

^{heeft intusschen aan}

voorwerpen, ^uit Portugal afkomstig, den

naam _{van Capra}

lusitanica gegeven"). This_suggests astill earlier publication ^of the

name which

Ihave been unableto find.

—

_{N. Hollister.}

THE YELLOW RAIL IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

When

Prof.

W. W. Cooke

_preparedhis list of birds of the District of Columbia, _publishedin these Proceedings, vol. 21,pp. 107-118, April11, 1908, he

had

only three records ^of the Yellow Rail (Coturnicops nove- boracensis) intheDistrict—one for 1879

and

two for 1893.

A

^fourth

specimen should

now

^berecorded.

On May

20, 1917, Mrs. E. Caminetti sent to the National Zoological Park a live Yellow Rail _justfound in the yard ^{at 307}

C

^St. N.

W.,

Washington, ^{D. C.}

The

bird, a female, was_apparentlyingood^condition butlived only four days. ^It

was

_placed

in theNational

Museum

collection.

— N.

Hollister.

27—Proc.Biol. Soc.Wash..Vol.31. 1918. (93)