AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 147 



THE AMERICAN BITTERN. 



Just after the sun has dropped behind the horizon and left the world 

 lighted by the yellow afterglow, the Bittern leaves his little swamp in 

 the deep woods and flys slowly to the big open swamp where he will 

 be likely to find a mate. 



Fying just high enough to clear the willows at the edge he travels 

 towards the center of the swamp where the grass tussocks stick up 

 above the mud and water. 



When he reaches a tusssck that suits him he lights and lies close to 

 it listening, then up comes his long neck and he stands rigid looking 

 more like a dead= branch than a living creature. 



He stands as if frozen, so still is he. Let us take a good look at 

 him while we have so good a chance. 



He seems to be mostly neck and legs, that runs in his family; his bill 

 is long and sharp and he can hit a powerful blow with it. 



The general color of the feathers is brown, while his long legs and 

 bill are yellow. 



When his look around has satisfied him that there is no immediate 

 danger he draws his head back between his shoulders and sends his 

 hollow '"boom-ah-boom" ascoss the swamp. After calling he sticks 

 his head up again and seems to be listening intently. 



He calls this way three or four times with intervals of listening. 



Then he begins a series of antics; he struts around his tussock, gives 

 little jumps and side steps and seems to be trying to see how foolish 

 he can act. 



But those antics are not foolish to him, he is making love to some 

 Miss Bittern who stands like a stick near by, and he does his best be- 

 cause he never heard of flirting and means business from the start. 



Not until our gay, but clumsy, wooer leaves the swamp does the 

 female relax her rigid position and seems to be more than a dead 

 branch sticking in the bog. 



After two or three evenings of this acting the birds will be seen 

 together, but now the female stays close to the ground while the male 

 raises his head when there is any disturbance. 



A little later they will build a big, clumsy nest in some thick clump 

 of cat-tails in the wettest part of the swamp where there is the least 

 danger from four-footed enemies. 



This nest is just a pile of reeds and swamp grasses, with the top 

 hollowed a little to keep the four brown eggs from rolling out. 



Early in July the young break their chocolate colored cells and then 

 we find the nest full of balls of fuzzy, yellow down. The old birds 

 guard these youngsters very carefully and have been known to stand 

 by their nest to fight even man. As soon as the young have the 

 strength they climb all over the nest and the reeds close to it, they 

 will even leave the immediate neighborhood of the nest if the reeds 

 ofTer a safe roadway. As soon as they get to climbing they grow 

 very fast and are soon able to shift for themselves. Early in. 

 September they start South, flying at night. 



Charles William Gross. 



