V 



Brewster on Large- Billed Water- Thrush. 133 



NESTING OF THE LARGE-BILLED WATER-THRUSH 

 (SIUEUS MOTAGILLA [Vieill.] Bp.). 



BY WILLIAM BREWSTER. 



Until very recently we have had little or no reliable information bear- 

 ing upon the nidification of the Large-billed Water-Thrush. Audubon 

 speaks of its nest as " placed at the foot and amongst the roots of a tree," 

 and describes the eggs as " flesh-colored, sprinkled with darker red on the 

 larger end " ; but as he failed to distinguish this bird from its northern 

 congener (S. neevia), his account is decidedly unsatisfactory. Mr. T. M. 

 Trippe says * briefly : " It forms a very neat nest of twigs and grass, which 

 it usually conceals under the roots of a tree overhanging a steep bank or 

 ravine," but he tells us nothing concerning the eggs. In June, 1873, a nest 

 with four fresh eggs was taken at Franklin Station, New London County, 

 Conn., by Mr. Ernest Ingersoll, and fully identified by the capture of 

 the female parent. Of the nest he says : t " It was rather loosely and care- 

 lessly constructed of fine grass and some little dead fibrous moss ; but 

 beneath, a few, and about the outside, particularly in front, many dead 

 leaves were put, as a sort of breastwork to decrease the size of the entrance 

 and more thoroughly conceal the sitting bird. It was underneath the 

 edge of a perpendicular bank eight or ten feet from the water." The eggs 

 were " lustrous white," and " were more or less profusely spotted all over 

 with dots and specks, and some obscure zigzaggings, of two tints of red- 

 dish-brown, with numerous faint points and touches of lilac and very pale 

 underlying red." 



The writer had the good fortune to secure two fully identified nests 

 of this species in Knox County, Indiana, during the past spring. The 

 first, taken with the female parent May 6, contained six eggs, which had 

 been incubated a few days. The locality was the edge of a lonely forest 

 pool in the depths of a cypress swamp near White River. A large tree 

 had fallen into the shallow water, and the earth adhering to the roots 

 formed a nearly vertical but somewhat irregular wall about six feet in 

 height and ten or twelve in breadth. Near the upper edge of this, in a 

 cavity among the finer roots, was placed the nest, which, but for the sit- 

 uation and the peculiar character of its composition, would have been 

 exceedingly conspicuous. Its presence was first betrayed by the female, 

 which darted off as one of our party brushed by within a few feet. She 

 alighted on a low branch a few rods distant, uttering her sharp note of 

 alarm, and vibrating her tail in the usual characteristic manner, but other- 



* Notes on the Birds of Southern Iowa. Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist., Vol. 

 XV, 1873, p. 234. 

 t Ainer. Nat., Vol. VIII, p. 238. 



