LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN WILD FOWL. 191 



being noticeable as the head assumed the normal position. This head-throwing per- 

 formance was practically the same as has been described by Doctor Townsend for 

 the golden-eye and has been observed by me frequently while watching redheads 

 and scaup ducks as well. 



The calls of the males were answered by the females with a low, guttural cuk cuk. 

 The four females then drew together until their breasts nearly touched, jerking their 

 heads and holding their necks stiff and straight as they did so. The males then 

 began swimming about them in circles, sometimes with their heads close to the 

 water after the fashion of the mallards, sometimes calling as already described, and 

 frequently jerking their heads so that the occiput struck the back. Occasionally 

 one of the males would approach a little closer to the females and then one of the 

 females would lower her head and chase him away, returning to her stand in the 

 middle of the circle. This performance was observed many times but there wore 

 no further developments, and the birds never paired or selected mates on this pond 

 so far as I could observe. 



Nesting. — In the summer of 1901 we found the canvasbacks breed- 

 ing quite abundantly in Steele County, North Dakota. Even then 

 their breeding grounds were being rapidly encroached upon by 

 advancing civilization which was gradually draining and cultivating 

 the sloughs in which this species nests. Since that time they have 

 largely, if not wholly disappeared from that region, as breeding birds, 

 and their entire breeding range is becoming more and more restricted 

 every year, as the great northwestern plains are being settled and 

 cultivated for wheat and other agricultural products. This and other 

 species of ducks are being driven farther and farther north and must 

 ultimately become exterminated unless large tracts of suitable land 

 can be set apart as breeding reservations, where the birds can find 

 congenial surroundings. As my experience with the nesting habits 

 of the canvasback in North Dakota will serve to illustrate its normal 

 methods, I can not do better than to quote from what I (1902) have 

 already published on the subject, as follows: 



The principal object of our visit to the sloughs in Steele County was to study the 

 breeding habits of the canvasbacks; so, soon after our arrival here, late in the after- 

 noon of June 7, we put on our hip-boots and started in to explore the northern end of 

 the big slough shown in the photograph. In the large area of open water we could 

 see several male canvasbacks and a few redheads swimming about, well out of gun 

 range Wading out through the narrow strip of reeds surrounding the open water, 

 and working along the outer edge of these, we explored first the small isolated patches 

 of reeds shown in the foreground of the picture. The water here was more than knee- 

 deep, and in some places we had to be extremely careful not to go in over the tops of 

 our boots so that progress was quite slow. We had hardly been wading over 10 

 minutes when, as I approached one of these reed patches, I heard a great splashing, 

 and out rushed a large, light-brown duck which, as she circled past me, showed very 

 plainlj- the long sloping head and pointed bill of the canvasback, 



A short search in the thick clump of tall reeds soon revealed the nest with its 11 

 e^s, 8 large, dark-colored eggs of the can\a8back and 3 smaller and lighter eggs of the 

 redhead. It was a large nest built upon a bulky mass of wet dead reeds, measuring 

 18 inches by 20 inches in outside diameter, the rim being built up 6 inches above the 

 water, the inner cavity being about 8 inches across by 4 inches deep. It was lined 



