7 
' 
. 
‘ 
THE HOODED MERGANSER. DOL 
when she takes wing, and flies off. If, however, she have 
sufficient notice of the approach of a person before he 
reaches gunshot she swims rapidly off, with her whole brood 
paddling behind her, 
until she turns a 
point or neck in . 
the pond or stream = 
where she happens 
to be, when, silently 
creeping into shore 
she, with her brood 
hides herself in the 
herbage on the land 
until the danger is 
past. When about two-thirds grown, these young Mer- 
gansers, like the young of most of the other fowls, are 
excellent eating. They are called “ Flappers,” because of 
their habit of flapping their wings on the water to aid their 
escape from pursuers. 
This species, in passing with its young from one body of 
water to another, often, while flying, carries them singly in 
its mouth ; and I have been told, that even after it has been 
shot and has fallen to the ground, it not unfrequently holds 
the chick. Mr. George A. Boardman informs me that the 
female of the Summer Duck often encroaches on the nest 
of this Merganser ; and he once witnessed an attempt of the 
latter to drive the other from her domicile, of which she 
had taken possession, and in which she was engaged in the 
duties of incubation. He watched them, and noticed, that, 
when the Wood-duck left the nest, the Merganser took 
possession of it; and, when she left it, the other did the 
same. 
