NOBTH AMEBICAN MARSH BIRDS 341 



perliaps half a mile wide; much of it is open water, but around the 

 shores is a broad strip of marsh with a rank growth of flags, pickerel 

 weed, and other aquatic vegetation; and at the upper end of it, 

 farthest from the lake, it is full of boggy or floating islands, surrounded 

 with water 8 to 10 feet deep, covered in the open spaces with 

 "bonnets " and white pond Ulies. It is an ideal place for both species 

 of gallinules. Our first nest was on one of the floating islands, far too 

 treacherous to walk on, overgrown mainly with a rank growth of wild 

 parsnip, conspicuous with its white blossoms, together with Pontede- 

 ria, Hydrocotyle, flags and sedges, the whole being tied together with 

 a tangle of morning glory vines. The nest was made of the dried 

 leaves and stems of Pontederi-a, firmly interwoven with the growing 

 plants and well concealed. Its rim was about 20 inches above the 

 water, it measured 8 by 10 inches in diameter, and was hollowed to a 

 depth of about 3 inches; the whole structure was about S inches in 

 depth. The other nest was similar, but slightly smaller and placed 2 

 inches lower, on a larger and firmer island, but not strong enough to 

 walk on, where the principal growth was Pontederia. 

 Audubon (1840) writes: 



The nest is generally placed among a kind of rushes that are green at all sea- 

 sons, round, very pithy, rarely more than 5 feet high, and grow more along the 

 margins of ponds than in the water itself. The birds gather many of them, and 

 fasten them at the height of 2 or 3 feet, and there the nest is placed. It is com- 

 posed of the most delicate rushes, whether green or withered, and is quite as 

 substantial as that of the common gallinule, flattish, having an internal diameter 

 of 8 or 10 inches, while the entire breadth is about 15. 



A nest found by Herbert W. Brandt, in Bexar County, Texas, on 

 June 8, 1919, is described in his notes as — 



a shallow platform located among the cat-tails and rushes near the shore in 

 shallow water and in an isolated clump. The cat-tails were bent down and 

 woven together in the manner of our least bittern and the nest would easily be 

 taken for one. The nest was about 30 inches above the water and a shallow 

 but well made platform of live flat leaves. 



Messrs. Quillin and Holleman (1918), referring to the same gen- 

 eral locality, say: 



Nests of this species are better built than those of the Florida gallinule, and are 

 placed at a greater elevation from the water. The majority are rarely under 2 

 feet, and in a few cases, where the exceptional growth of the reeds permitted, 

 they were found 4 or 5 feet from the water. Some are placed on the densely 

 matted boughs in thickets of willows growing in shallow water, but these are 

 always placed lower than those found in the reeds. 



Alexander Sprunt, jr., has sent me the following notes on the nest- 

 ing of the purple gallinule in South Carolina: 



This species is a much handsomer bird than the Florida gallinule, and in my 

 experience, much shyer. It is a summer resident of South Carolina, and fre- 

 quents the old rice plantations in large numbers. They are very partial to 

 92642— 26t 23 



