180 BULLETIN 135, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



ground with the dead body of a still younger bird of the same species dangUng 

 from its mouth. On catching this bird I found the head of the dead bird was 

 well down the throat of the captor and on puUing it out discovered that diges- 

 tion had progressed considerably. 



The young are fed at jfirst on regurgitated food; as thus described 

 by Doctor Cordier (1923): 



The actual act of feeding is, to say the least, a vicious and terrible affair. The 

 parent bird stands by the nest in a seemingly indifferent mood, whUe the young 

 are screaming and fighting for the best position. Each time the parent's bill is 

 within reach, a young bird seizes it crosswise at the base and jerks violently, 

 while there is much protesting noise from the other less fortunate youngsters. 

 The old bird may, with stoical indifference, refuse to feed for some time, during 

 which the young bird continues, with bull-dog tenacity, to puU and jerk 

 at the parent's beak getting nearer and nearer to the tip. When the psycholog- 

 ical moment for regurgitation arrives the partly digested fish is either forced down 

 the throat of the nestling, or, perchance it may light on the^interested photograph- 

 er's head or camera outfit. When the j'oung birds have been fed the parent 

 frequently stands by the nest for an hour or more, all the while uttering a con- 

 tented note, much like that of a barnyard hen as she struts around the yard with 

 her half-grown brood following her. The owner of a nest near my tent had the 

 habit of descending to the ground and eating billf ul after billful of the mud so 

 abundant under the trees, continually dancing and jumping around as if enjoying 

 the feast. 



Plumages. — The downy young little blue heron is like the downy 

 young snowy egret, all pure white. The body plumage is the first 

 to appear and the back is well feathered before the young bird is half 

 grown and before the flight feathers burst their sheaths; the wings 

 and tail are not complete until the bird is fully grown. The primaries 

 are tipped with bluish black when they first appear, but the rest of 

 the Juvenal plumage is all pure white. This plumage, wholly white 

 except the wing tips, is worn during the first fall and winter without 

 much change; I have seen it as late as May 1. But usually young 

 birds begin to acquire some blue in the plumage by February, which 

 increases during the spring. Young birds are often found breeding 

 in this first nuptial, mixed, plumage, which has suggested the idea 

 that they are adults in a white phase. The amount of blue in this 

 first nuptial plumage varies greatly in different individuals. Usually 

 it appears first as a bluish wash in the crown or a sprinkling of blue 

 in the primaries or tertials; the color then spreads to the lores, neck, 

 and back, until the latter becomes largely blue in April; at about 

 this time some new scapulars, many new wing coverts, and occasion- 

 ally some new remiges, wholly blue, are acquired by molt, in addition 

 to those which are sprinkled with blue; these last suggest the possi- 

 bility of color change. The above is the normal or commonest type 

 of progress, but there are exceptions to the rule. Some advanced 

 birds begin to show a suffusion of blue in the crown, neck, and pri- 

 maries as early as November. Some remain nearly all white through 



