Harry Harris Explores Catalina Island
From His Home State of Missouri:
Birds Observed During March, 1919

At least one, and probably two, Sparrow Hawks (Falco sparverius subsp.) were seen on numerous occasions about Avalon and on the terraces overlooking the town, and on March 9, three of these birds were seen on a ten-mile walk toward the upper end of the island. On this same walk, about five miles from the town, a Pigeon Hawk (Falco columbarius subsp.) was seen at close range.

The Sapsucker whose work is so much in evidence on the trees in and about Avalon was caught at his drilling on two occasions, both within the town ilself, on the 15th and 16th respectively, and proved to be the Red-breasted (8phyrapicus ruber ruber).

On the 10th a flock of perhaps twenty Juncos (Junco hyemalis subsp.) was noted high up the slopes back of the town in a very brushy place where the going was bad. The birds were positively identified as Juncos, but a close enough view was not had to warrant even a guess as to the form.

A Hermit Thrush, supposedly the Alaska (Hylocichla guttata guttata), was everywhere common, from the beach to the top of the ridge, and no place on the island was visited where these birds could not be found scattered about in numbers. They were by far the most numerous land-bird observed during the entire seventeen days.

Three Western Robins (Planeslicus migratorius propanquus) were seen on the 6th in the orchard of John Brinkley (Chicken John), whose attention was called to them and who stated that in a twenty-eight year’s residence on the spot he had not before noticed the bird. Two residents of Avalon reported Robins in their door-yards on the same day, and remarked on the unusualness of seeing Robins on Catalina.

A scattered flock of between thirty and forty Western Bluebirds (Sialia mexicana occidentalis) was under observation from March 5 to 10 on the beautiful golf course back of the town. These birds also proved to be curiosities to some of the natives. A Sharp-shinned Hawk was seen to attack this flock repeatedly. The Bluebirds apparently left during the night of the lOth, as they were searched for over the entire lower end of the island and none was met with after that date.
-HARRY HARRIS, Kansas City, Missouri
April 18, 1919.

Why would a birder, named Harry Harris, born and raised in Missouri, and a resident of Kansas City, come to visit Catalina Island in 1919? Harry Harris was also a bibliophile and a biographer of American Ornithology, with an interest also in painting of birds, also come to visit Catalina Island? There were no famous ornithologists living on Catalina, nor artists of birds, as far as this writer and biologist is aware? And why did spend 17 days on Catalina, mostly around Avalon? Finally what tree was it that he observed the sapsucker woodpecking holes into while in Avalon? Perhaps it was a Eucalyptus.

It is known that he had just finished a major monographic book on the birds of Kansas City in 1919, so perhaps he was rewarding himself with a vacation to sunny southern California, where he would also see some different and new birds. Perhaps he wanted to see a Condor, which was becoming rarer by the 1920s, and after getting a view of one, he made a vacation trip to Catalina Island?

We also know that in approximately 6 years, around 1925, he would forever move away from Missouri and Kansas City, to become a lifelong resident of California. Harry Harris came to reside in Los Angeles County, at Eaglerock, and he would become active with the birders of southern California and northern California. He would become president of the southern California chapter of the Cooper Ornithological Club, as well as write several articles on birders and ornithologists of western North America. He would soon be writing a chronicle of the California Condor, which today, is still considered an important historical contribution and is quoted regularly by scientists, naturalists, and environmentalists, who are championing the return of the California Condor to the wilds of California.