36 BULLETIX 130, UjN'ITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



bird swam slowly about her admirer followed, his head drawn in close to his 

 shoulders and the bill pointing downward, the tip not more than an inch or 

 two from the surface of the water. When within 6 or 7 feet of the female 

 he would raise his head till it pointed straight upward and give a succession 

 of deep notes not unlike the baying of hounds heard at a distance. These 

 notes were usually in series of four or five, and with each the head was thrown 

 still farther back. The long tail was carried straight out horizontally as 

 a general thing, or depressed slightly, but at times was elevated to an angle 

 of about 45°. After calling, the bird dropped his head to its former position 

 close to the water. All this time the female kept up a low quacking. After 

 several of these sallies she would face her suitor, extend the neck and head 

 flat upon the water and swim toward him, turning when within a foot or two, 

 and pass him whereupon he turned and the performance began all over again. 

 After about an hour of this the female took flight closely followed by the male, 

 and after circling the pond several times both birds returned to the water. 

 The other two females had retired to the other end of the pond where they 

 had been quietly feeding, but the male now chased both of these birds out of 

 the pond and then returned to the remaining bird. I have several times seen 

 a female flying closely pursued by two males, all three twisting and turning 

 so that it was difficult for the eye to follow them, but the female always 

 kept in the lead. 



Mr. Ekblaw, in his notes, writes : 



On July 1, 1914, near the little Eskimo village, Umanak, on North Star Bay, 

 I was able to study the mating antics of the oldsquaw at close range. The 

 day was ideally calm, clear, and mild, and the birds were unusually stirred 

 by the " cosmic urge."' Just across the steep ridge southeast of the house 

 lies the broad, terraced, flood plain of a creek which now is a mere remnant 

 of a stream uuquestiojiably much larger in the past. The lowest terrace of 

 this plain is one of such imperfect drainage that ponds and swales are nu- 

 merous. About the shallow ponds and wet swales grasses and sedges grow 

 in abundance. The ponds teem with tiny animal life. Here the oldsquaws 

 breed and nest in numbers. It is one of their favorite haunts. I was con- 

 cealed among the rocks of a ledge some 50 yards from a rather large, compara- 

 tively deep pond, where the ice was melted along the edges. In the open 

 water, on the edge of the ice, and along the grass-covered banks, seven pairs of 

 oldsquaws were distributed, and two males were struggling strenuously for 

 an unmated female. The paired birds were swimming contentedly about the 

 pool, busily preening their feathers on the ice, or sleeping cosily on the banks ; 

 the unmated female and the two males were strenuously sweeping the water 

 or chasing over the pond in swift zigzag flight. Whenever one of the males 

 attempted to mate with the female, the other invariably attacked, much to 

 the evident displeasure of the female, who would then take quick wing, 

 noisily protesting, and pursued by both males. Settled in the pool the males 

 fought fiercely, splashing and churning the water. Neither seemed able to 

 vanquish the other, and when I left my hiding place they were still struggling. 



Nesting. — Audubon's (1840) historic account of finding the old- 

 squaw breeding on the southern coast of Labrador is now ancient 

 history, but it is worth quoting as a record of conditions which no 

 longer exist. He writes: 



In the course of one of my rambles along the borders of a large freshwater 

 lake, near Bras-d'Or, in Labrador, on the 2Sth of July, 1833, I was delighted 

 by the sight of several young broods of this species of duck, all carefully at- 



