340 THE NESTS AND EGGS OF BRITISH BIRDS. 

 Family RALLID^. • . Genus Gallinula. 



W A T E R H E N. 



Gallinula chloropus i^Linncsus). 

 Double Brooded. Laying season, March to July. 



British breeding area : The Waterhen is com- 

 monly and widely distributed throughout the British 

 Islands, even extending to such bare and wild localities 

 as the Outer Hebrides and the Orkneys, but not reaching 

 the Shetlands as a breeding species, only as a wanderer. 



Breeding habits : The Waterhen is a resident in 

 the British Islands, and for the most part sedentary, 

 unless driven out by long-continued frosts. It may be 

 found breeding on the banks of almost every description 

 of water, provided shelter of some kind is available ; 

 whilst in many places it lives almost in a state of semi- 

 domestication. We can scarcely class the Waterhen 

 as gregarious, but it is certainly to a great extent social 

 during the breeding season, numbers of nests often 

 being made within a small area, yet even then each 

 pair shows a strong disposition to resent encroachment 

 on its own particular nest-haunt, though ready enough 

 to swim and feed in company with the rest. I am of 

 opinion that this bird pairs for life, and not only keeps 

 to one haunt season by season, but often makes its nest 

 in one particular spot. The nest is placed in a great 

 variety of situations, perhaps most frequently among 

 flags, rushes, reeds, and iris, often at some distance from 

 shore, in moderately shallow water. Sometimes it is 

 built amongst a mass of branches bent down into the 

 water, and is then entirely supported by the network 

 of twigs ; at others it is made amongst exposed roots, 

 on the banks of the water. More rarely a fir tree has 



