352 BULLETIN 135, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



is assumed. Adults have a complete postnuptial molt in the late 

 summer and a very limited prenuptial molt in the spring, with no 

 well-marked seasonal differences in plumage. 



Food. — Gallinules seek their food among the aquatic vegetation 

 where they live. Their long toes enable them to walk with ease over 

 the lily pads, where they may be seen picking up their food from the 

 surface; they can also swim and dive, if necessary to secure it, or 

 travel and cUmb with case among the denser vegetation. Their food 

 consists of seeds, roots, and soft parts of succulent water plants, snails 

 and other small mollusks, grasshoppers, and various other insects and 

 worms. Dr. Alexander Wetmore (1916) found that, in Porto Rico, 

 96.75 per cent of their food was vegetable, grass and rootlets forming 

 90.75 per cent and the other 6 per cent consisting of seeds of grasses 

 and various weeds, much of which must have been picked up on dry 

 land. The remaining 3.25 per cent was made up of insects and a few 

 small mollusks. 



Behavior. — On its migrations to and from its more northern breeding 

 resorts the Florida gallinule shows greater powers of flight than are 

 apparent at ordinary times; when making such a long flight, or when 

 flying from one pond to another, it travels at a reasonable height 

 with a direct and fairly swift flight the head and feet being extended. 

 But when seen on its breeding grounds, or in the ponds where it feeds, 

 its flight seems weak, labored, and awkward; it flutters along, barely 

 skimming the surface, half flying and half running on the water, as if 

 xmable to rise: or, with a feeble, raillike flight, it just clears the tops 

 of the swamp vegetation, into which it suddenly drops again, as if 

 exhausted. 



It swims with ease, in spite of its lack of webbed feet, punctuating 

 its foot strokes with a graceful dovelike motion of its head; while 

 swimming the forward parts are depressed and the hind quarters are 

 raised, the white under tail coverts serving as a conspicuous signal. 

 It can dive to obtain its food or to escape its enemies, often hiding 

 under water, with its head or bill concealed among the water 

 plants. 



It seems most at ease, however, and its movements are most grace- 

 ful, when walking lightly about over the lily pads, picking up its 

 food with quick, nervous strokes, much after the manner of a barn- 

 yard fowl. It is equally at homo on land where most of its food is 

 obtained. If disturbed it runs swiftly to cover and disappears in 

 the reeds, where it can travel with all the skill of a rail and can even 

 cUmb to the tops of the tall stalks. It can easily be distinguished 

 from the coot by the absence of the white bill, so conspicuous in that 

 species, and by its {more slender form; its color and its green legs 

 will distinguish it from the purple gallinule. The red frontal shield 



