The Behavior of the Least Bittern 



427 



ance at this time. The feathers were fairly glued to the body, and the 

 head and neck appeared no thicker than some of the dried reeds that com- 

 posed the nest. The bill, pointing directly upward, widened barely appreci- 

 ably into the head and neck, and the feathers of the lower neck were held 

 free from the body and compressed to as narrow a point as the bill at the 

 other end. The neck appeared to be entirely separate from the body, which 

 was flattened so as to become but a part of the nest itself. There was not a 

 movement, not even a turning of the serpent-like eyes which glared at me over 

 the corners of the mouth. Every line was stiff and straight, every curve was an 

 angle. It mattered not that all about the vegetation was brilliant green, while 

 the bird was buffy brown. It was no more a bird than was the nest below it. 

 I recalled the habit of the American Bittern of rotating so as always to keep 

 its striped neck toward the ob- 

 server, and I moved slowly to 

 another side of the nest. But 

 this bird was not relying upon 

 the color of its neck to conceal 

 it. It was quite as unbirdlike 

 from any angle, and it moved 

 not a feather. 



But this was not its only 

 method of concealment, as was 

 shown a few minutes later. I 

 parted the flags directly in front 

 of the bird, to see how close an 

 approach it would permit. My 

 hands came within twelve inches 

 of it before it melted away over 

 the back of the nest. Its move- 

 ments were apparently very 

 dehberate, and yet almost in- 

 stantaneously it disappeared into 

 the flags. It did not go far, and 

 in a very few minutes it came 

 back. Very slowly it pushed its 

 vertical neck and upturned bill 

 between the flags until it just 

 fitted the space between two of 

 the upright stalks at the back 

 of the nest. No longer were the 

 feathers drawn closely to the 

 neck, which was at this time the "^"^ female least bittern assuming 



' . . the broken-reed POSTURE' UPON THE 



only part visible. Instead, they approach of an enemy. 



