Image from the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
Contributed by Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley.
| www.biodiversitylibrary.org
Transcription
Vancouver, Oct. 10
This forenoon went to see Mr.
R.A. Cumming, his collection, and the
Chinese Starlings that he had written
were to be seen in his neighborhood.
This was about 5 miles south of the
city, near end of the Fraser St. car-line;
610 E. 64th Avenue; and nearly to the
flood-bottom of the Fraser River, a
distributary of which was in sight.
This is rural, scattering houses, vegetable
gardens, and extensive tracts or thickets
of native deciduous vegetation. The
Starlings, or Chinese Mynahs, constituted
the feature of the morning. Mrs. G.
and I counted 27 in sight at
one moment, partly on the ground
[a pasture] around a cow, partly
on a fence, and part in bushes.
Mr. Cumming thought there might be 50
or 60 in the near vicinity; but they
move about, visiting a nearby
"abattoir" for grain and meat scraps.
Now they are feeding mostly on wild
berries; we saw them eat red cherries
and berries of the "white dogwood." Cumming
estimates that there are 5 or 6
thousand in the region of Vancouver,
and that they have reached the