Additions to the List of the Birds of Louisiana

Excerpt

Oberholser's "Bird Life of Louisiana" (La. Dept. Conserv. Bull. 28, 1938), was a notable contribution to the ornithology of the Gulf Coast region and the lower Mississippi Valley, for it gave not only a complete distributional synopsis of every species and subspecies of bird then known to occur in Louisiana but also nearly every record of a Louisiana bird up to 1938. However, at the time of the appearance of this publication, one of the most active periods in Louisiana ornithology was just then beginning. The bird collection in the Louisiana State University Museum of Zoology had been started only the year before, and the first comprehensive field work since the time of Beyer, Kohn, Kopman, and Allison, two decades before, was still in its initial stage. Since 1938 the Museum of Zoology has acquired more specimens of birds from Louisiana than were collected there in all of the years prior to that time. Many parts of the state have been studied where no previous work at all had been done. Also in the last eight years some capable ornithologists have visited the state as students at Louisiana State University, and each has contributed greatly to the mass of new data now available. Despite the excellence of Oberholser's compilation of records, it is, therefore, not surprising that even at this early date twenty-four additions can be made to the list of birds known from Louisiana. Furthermore, this recently acquired information permits the emendation of the recorded status of scores of species, each previously ascribed to the state on the basis of comparatively meager data.

The plan is to publish eventually a revision of the birds of Louisiana which will incorporate all of the new information, but the projected scope of this work is such that many years may elapse before it is finished. The present paper is intended to record only the more pertinent additions, particularly records that may be significant in connection with the preparation of the fifth edition of the American Ornithologists' Union's "Check-list of North American Birds." There are numerous species for which Oberholser cited only a few records, but of which we now have many records and large series of specimens. If, in such instances, the treatment given in the fourth edition of the American Ornithologists' Union's Check-list would not be materially affected, I have omitted mention of the new material in this paper.

I am indebted to a number of ornithologists who have presented their notes on Louisiana birds to the Museum of Zoology and who have done much to supplement its collections. Outstanding among these are Thomas R. Howell, Robert J. Newman, Sam M. Ray, Robert E. Tucker, Harold E. Wallace, and the late Austin W. Burdick. Their efforts in behalf of the Museum have been untiring. I am grateful also to Thomas D. Burleigh and Jas. Hy. Bruns, both of whom have played an integral part in our field activities in recent years and without whose help much less would have been accomplished. John S. Campbell, Ambrose Daigre, James Nelson Gowanloch, Sara Elizabeth Hewes, E. A. McIlhenny, Edouard Morgan, and George L. Tiebout, Jr., have generously contributed notes and specimens which are duly attributed in the following text. For assistance in taxonomic problems, or for the loan of comparative material, I wish to thank John W. Aldrich, Herbert Friedmann, Howard K. Gloyd, Alden H. Miller, Harry C. Oberholser, James L. Peters, Karl P. Schmidt, George M. Sutton, J. Van Tyne, and Alexander Wetmore.

Sula sula sula (Linnaeus), Red-footed Booby

An immature individual of this species came aboard a boat of the Louisiana Department of Conservation near the mouth of Bayou Scofield, 7 miles below Buras, Plaquemines Parish, on November 1, 1940. It was captured by J. N. McConnell, who delivered it to James Nelson Gowanloch of the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. The bird was then turned over to me in the flesh for preparation and deposit in the Louisiana State University Museum of Zoology. It has since been examined by James L. Peters and Alexander Wetmore, who confirmed the identification. This is the first specimen of the species obtained in the United States. The only other record of its occurrence in this country is that of individuals observed near Micco, Brevard County, Florida, on February 12, 1895 (Bangs, Auk, 19, 1902: 395-396). To eliminate possible confusion in the literature, attention is called here to the fact that the above-listed specimen was erroneously recorded by an anonymous writer (La. Conserv. Rev., 10, Fall Issue, 1940: 12) as a Gannet, Morus bassanus (Linnaeus)....