GREBES. 57 



water and the body into the air. It is an expert and rapid swimmer 

 also, and all its movements on the water are exceedingly graceful. 

 When pursued, these birds invariably endeavor to escape by diving, 

 though when on the wing they fly rapidly, their necks and feet 

 stretched at full length " (Chamberlain). 



3. Colymbus auritus Linn. Horned Grebe. Ad. in summer. — 

 Top of the head, hind neck, and throat, glossy blackish; lores pale chestnut; 

 stripe, and plumes behind the eye, butfy ochraceous, deeper posteriorly ; back 

 and wings blackish ; secondaries white ; foreneck, upper breast, and sides 

 chestnut ; lower breast and belly white. Ad. in winter and Im. — Upper parts 

 grayish black ; under parts silvery white, sometimes washed with grayish ou 

 the throat and breast. L., 13-50 ; W., 5-40 ; Tar., 1-75 ; B., 90. 



Range. — Breeds from northern United States (northern Illinois, St. Clair 

 Flats) northward; winters southward to the Gulf States. 



Washington, common W. V., fall to Apl. 25. Long Island, abundant 

 T. v., rare W. V., Oct. to Apl. Sing Sing, common T. V., Oct. to Dec. ; Mch. 

 Cambridge, casual. 



Nest.^ a mass of water-soaked, decaying vegetation, floating among rushes 

 in a slough, generally attached to its surroundings. Eggs., two to seven, dull 

 white, more or less soiled, 1*74 x 1-15. 



This species and the next are probably frequently mistaken for 

 each other in life, and the same common names are in some instances 

 applicable to both. Mr. Ernest E. Thompson writes of a captive in- 

 dividual : " When ordinarily swimming, the feet strike out alternately, 

 and the progression is steady ; but sometimes both feet struck together, 

 and then the movement was by great bounds, and was evidently cal- 

 culated to force the bird over an expanse of very weedy water, or 

 through any tangle of weeds or rushes in which it might have found 

 itself. When lifted out of the water, the feet worked so fast as to be 

 lost to the eye in a mere haze of many shadowy feet with one attach- 

 ment. When placed on the ground, it was perfectly helpless " (Birds 

 of Manitoba, p. 466). 



6. Podilymbus podiceps (Z*/^7^.). PiEn-BiLLEu Grebe ; Dabchick; 



Diedapper; IIell-diver; Water-witch. (See Fig. 5, a.) Ad. in summer. — 

 Upper parts glossy, brownish black; throat black; upper breast, front and 

 sides of the neck, and sides of the body, washed with brownish and indis- 

 tinctly mottled with blackish ; lower breast and belly white ; a black band 

 across the bill. Ad. in winter and Im. — Much like the above, but throat 

 white and no black band on the bill. L. 13-50; W., 5-10 ; Tar., 1-45 ; B., 85. 



^a«^e.— Argentine Republic northward through Mexico and the West In- 

 dies to Hudson Bay and Great Slave Lake, breeding locally throughout its 

 range ; winters from New Jersey southward. 



Washington, common W. V., Aug. 25 to Apl. or May. Long Island, un- 

 common T. v., Sept. to Apl. Sing Sing, common T. V., Apl. 6 to Apl. 20 ; 



