46 U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 211 



prevented by stormy south or southwest winds, the Ricebirds have come punc- 

 tually on the night of the 21st of August, apparently coming from seaward. All 

 night their chirp can be heard passing over our summer homes on South Island, 

 which is situated 6 miles to the east of our rice plantations, in full view of the 

 ocean. Curious to say, we have never seen this flight during the day. During 

 the nights of August 21, 22, 23, and 24, millions of these birds make their appear- 

 ance and settle in the rice fields. From the 21st of August to the 25th of September 

 our every effort is to save the crop. Men, boys, and women, with guns and 

 ammunition, are posted on every 4 or 5 acres, and shoot daily an average of about 

 1 quart of powder to the gun. This firing commences at first dawn of day and is 

 kept up until sunset. After all this expense and trouble our loss of rice per acre 

 seldom falls under 5 bushels, and if from any cause there is a check to the crop 

 during its growth which prevents the grain from being hard, but in milky con- 

 dition, the destruction of such fields is complete, it not paying to cut and bring 

 the rice out of the field. * * * 



Fall. — As soon as the young are on the wing, in July, and the males 

 have ceased to sing, the bobolinks, old and young, disappear from 

 their nesting grounds and retire to more secluded haunts in the marshes 

 and along the banks of sluggish streams, where they feed on the seeds 

 of wild rice, wild oats, and various weeds, and become quite incon- 

 spicuous during the molting season. Migration from the northern 

 part of the bird's range begins in July, and by August it is in full 

 swing all through the United States. The fall flight is mainly if not 

 wholly by night; we often hear the distinctive clink note coming to us 

 out of the darkness, as the scattered flocks pass over us. They stop 

 to feed during the day, but probably do not move on every night, for 

 they are known to roost in enormous numbers in the ricefields. 

 Where food is plentiful and attractive, they probably stop over for a 

 night or two and become excessively fat. 



The fall migration of the bobolink, a long one and a remarkable one, 

 in the main is a reversal of the spring route, but more concentrated. 

 From the far western extension of the breeding range the birds retrace 

 the steps by which they extended their range westward, flying almost 

 east to the Atlantic coast. Only a scattering few take the shorter 

 route southward through the Western States and Central America, 

 and a comparatively few migrate through the Mississippi Valley, 

 mostly east of the river. As Dr. Wetmore (1926) puts it: "When 

 southward flight begins, it comes with a rush that distributes the 

 flocks far southward, so that on the east coast the birds arrive at 

 suitable points in the region from Maryland south to Georgia and 

 Florida almost simultaneously at some date between the middle of 

 August and the first of September." Meantime, the heavy flight 

 from the eastern Provinces and States has poured down along the 

 Atlantic coast, to join the western birds, where the main stream of 

 migrants converges into a narrow funnel on the southeastern coast and 

 overflows the whole peninsula of Florida. From there, three routes 



