A Day with the Birds on a Guiana Savanna 



237 



From this mass, giving forth a shrill whistle which soon deepens into a per- 

 fect roar of wings, single lines of Ducks shoot out in all directions, passing 

 up the river on right and left over the savanna. They are Gray-necked Tree- 

 ducks,^ with a thin scattering of Rufous" and White-faced^ Tree-ducks. The 

 great wave of life never ceases for a moment, but widens and thickens, and wheels 

 behind us, until the whole sky is pitted with their bodies. I take picture after 

 picture, with the ground glass revealing myriads of swiftly moving birds. We 

 count those in one short line near us, and find there are 420 individuals. It is 

 impossible to count the whole number, but there must be at least fifteen or twenty 



LAGOON AXD SAVANNA FROM THE BUNGALOW 



thousand in the first great flock of Ducks which we encounter. Little by little 

 the Ducks settle down on the savanna, and soon nothing is visible except hundreds 

 of their heads and necks stretched high, and all watching us curiously. These 

 birds are Tree-ducks only in name, as next month hundreds of eggs will be found 

 scattered all over the savanna, and the flocks will gradually dissolve into pairs, 

 each to nest on some sheltered hummock in the marsh. In the course of the 

 trip, we pass several such masses of Ducks as I have described, while smaller 

 flocks of several hundred are constantly passing overhead. Now and then we 

 hear a louder whistle of wings, and a family of four or five great black Muscovy 

 Ducks'^ rushes past, the leader, a drake, being almost twice the size of the others. 

 A low line of shrubs and small trees appears along the right bank of the narrow 

 winding river, in which Great Kiskadee Flycatchers'^ are nesting every hundred 

 yards or so, and Smooth-billed Anis^ flutter awkwardly and utter their harsh 



^Dendrocygna discolor 

 ^Dendrocygna bicolor 



^Dendrocygna viduata 

 *Cairina mosehata^ 



^■Pitangus sulphuralns 

 ^ Crotophaga ani 



