BIRDS OF MINNESOTA. 31 



question of the supply of their food, which is mainly small 

 fishes. These are abundant in the shallow streams, borders 

 of the lakes and ponds, until sealed up by the ice. Most 

 writers upon the habits of this unique species speak of the 

 use of the lower mandible and gular sac as a scoop, or dip net, 

 for gathering in their food. This seems possible, and even 

 probable, yet I am compelled to say that while I have often 

 observed their habit of dropping the inferior mandible slightly 

 beneath the surface of the water when the upper one seemed 

 only to rest on it, and thus allow the water to pass into the 

 mouth as they were swimming about in deep as well as shallow 

 water, I have never discovered the slightest evidence of their 

 receiving food at such times Like their renowned habit of 

 extending their mandibles in a series of yawning like motions 

 when standing upon the land, I have regarded the other as 

 essentially a sort of meaningless diversion. Perhaps to rinse 

 out the gular pouch. I am confident I could not have 

 been mistaken, as my observations were made when the birds 

 were under the most favorable circumstances for being 

 observed, and I have employed a superior field glass while 

 perfectly concealed from their sight. Whether seizing a 

 minnow, or a pickerel weighing three and a half pounds, as in 

 one instance, the fish is grasped transversely, when it is 

 tossed into the air and invariably received with its head fore- 

 most in its descent into the pouch. 



The sac, or pouch, is a temporary repository in which the 

 food is retained for a longer or shorter period as required for 

 supplies for digestion. The gular sac has no element of "a 

 dip-net for catching prey", having no outlet for the water 

 "shipped," not even the pectinated rami of the bill of several 

 species of ducks. They are well known to seize great quanti- 

 ties of fish upon occasion, and it is equally well known that 

 their stomachs are relatively exceptionally small. The sac is 

 therefore an inexorable necessity for transportation in their 

 prolonged flights over frozen lakes and rivers, and has been 

 found on repeated occasions in i^ossession of from one to several 

 fishes. One at least of the purposes of the sac cannot be 

 questioned. 



In the latter part of May the old nests are slightly repaired 

 or added to of such materials as are easily obtained, and the 

 three to four eggs laid. They are very rudimentary, consist- 

 ing usually of dirt scraped together and overlaid with coarse 

 reeds, moss, &c., and are located quite near each other in close 



