LIFE HISTORIES OP NORTH AMERICAN DWING BIRDS. 45 



gradually sink down backward, like a disappearing frog, without 

 making a ripple. I have always supposed that the grebes do not use 

 their wings under water, but Audubon (1840) had a good chance 

 to study them in captivity and says : 



We placed them in a large tub of water, where we could see all their sub- 

 aqueous movements. They swam round the sides of the tub in the manner of 

 the puffin, moving their wings in accordance with their feet, and continued so 

 a much longer time than one could suppose it possible for them to remain under 

 water, coming up to breathe, and plunging again with astonishing celerity. 



Except during the breeding season this grebe does tiot associate 

 much with other species ; it is usually seen singly, in pairs, or in very 

 small parties. Dr. Frank M. Chapman's (1912) experience shows 

 that it is not always so solitary ; he says : 



On Heron Lake, Minnesota, in early October, I have seen pied-billed grebes, 

 in close-massed flocks, containing a hundred or more birds, cruising about 

 in open water. 



Prof. Lynds Jones writes me that : 



On small bodies of water they mix somewhat with the other water birds, 

 more from necessity than from choice. Threatened danger will almost always 

 result in the separation of the grebes from the ducks with which they may be 

 associated. 



Rev. W. F. Henninger reports that he has seen them associated 

 with blue-winged teal and black duck and playfully chasing around 

 with them. 



The vocal powers of the pied-billed grebe are limited to a few 

 notes, heard mainly in the breeding season, for at other times it is 

 generally a silent bird. Dr. Chapman (1908) describes its love 

 notes as follows : 



Its notes, as I have heard them in the Montezuma marshes, are very loud 

 and sonorous with a cuckoo-like quality, and may be written cow-cow-coio-coio- 

 cow-cow-cotv-cotv-coiv-cow-uh, cow-uh, cow-uh-cow-uh. These notes vary in 

 number, and are sometimes followed by prolonged wailing coics or uhs, almost 

 human in their expressiveness of pain and fear. This is apparently the love 

 song of the male, in which his mate sometimes joins with a cick-cuk-cuk, 

 followed by a slower ugh, ugh, iigh. 



Mr. W. L. Dawson (1909) designates the notes as "an odd bub- 

 bling giggle, heggy, keggy, keggy, keggy, keggy, keggy, keggy, etc., 

 rendered with great rapidity " ; he also refers to a single excited aow, 

 uttered from time to time. Mr. E. E. Thompson (1890) describes a 

 peculiar call note " pr-r-r-r-r- tow tow tow tow tow " which he as- 

 cribed to this species in Manitoba. 



The pied-billed grebe may be distinguished in the field from other 

 grebes by the absence of white in the wings, by the general brownish 

 tinge, and by the short, thick, henlike bill. 



