NORTH AMERICAN MARSH BIRDS 3 



of wild geese. If the color on the water was novel, that of the flock while in the 

 air was truly surprising, a cloud of flame-colored pink, like the hues of a bril- 

 liant sunset. As far as we could descry the birds, the color was the great conspic- 

 uous feature. Looked at through the glass, while in flight, the individuals com- 

 posing the flock were seen to be mostly adults. I saw only a small division of the 

 lighter colored immature birds. These seemed to have their own particular posi- 

 tion in the flock, and on this and subsequent occasions, when seen, these younger 

 individuals were always alone. As nearly as could be estimated there were 

 at least 1,000 birds in this flock, and of these all but about 50 appeared to be 

 adults. 



Twelve years later, on March 26, 1902, Dr. Reginald Heber Howe, 

 jr. (1902) "observed a flock of from 500 to 1,000 birds in a little bay to 

 the east of Cape Sable," probably in the same locality. This was 

 about the last of the flamingo in Florida, for in the following year, 

 1903, I spent parts of April and May in this vicinity, visiting Indian 

 Key, where Audubon saw his first flock, and exploring the coast and 

 islands from Cape Sable to a bay called Snake Bight, which I judge 

 from their descriptions to be the place where Scott and Howe saw 

 the two flocks referred to above. I made another visit to this same 

 region in March and April in 1908, but saw no signs of flamingos 

 on either trip. Perhaps they may still visit that region occasionally 

 in winter, but the resident birds are gone. 



In past years the flamingo probably visited the coasts of Louisiana 

 and Texas, occasionally if not regularly, but no specimens have been 

 taken there in recent years. W. L. McAtee (1911) reported seeing 

 one at Cameron, Louisiana, on December 6, 1910. And R. D. Camp 

 told me that he saw one at Bahia Grande, Cameron County, Texas, 

 on October 15, 1912 and in September, 1915. 



Nesting. — There was much controversy among the earlier writers as 

 to the nesting habits of the flamingo; very little was known about 

 it and there was an erroneous impression that the nest was a tall, 

 truncated cone on which the bird sat astride, with its long legs reach- 

 ing down to the ground on either side; it was so iUustrated in draw- 

 ings and in mounted groups. C. J. Maynard (1888) was the fij-st to 

 discover and describe a colony of American flamingos, establishing 

 the fact that the flamingo sits on its nest with its legs folded under 

 it, just as any other bird does. He gives a graphic account of his 

 experiences in finding a large colony on Andros Island, in the Baha- 

 mas, on May 14, 1884, in which he describes the nesting rookery, as 

 follows : 



The rookery occupied about a half acre of land, or rather what was once land, 

 for all, or nearly all, were surrounded by water, and were built on a kind of pen- 

 insula which h.'id water on three sides of it. The nests were constructed wholly 

 of marl piled layer upon layer, without waiting for any layer to dry, for in some 

 cases the bottom was as soft as the top. In scooping up the marl the birds evi- 

 dently use the lower mandible of the bill, while it is spread and flattened with the 

 feet. The clay is not gathered at random about the nest, but from a pit on 



