CANl^AS-BACK DUCK. 1 57 



cured practically no canvas-backs. On the other hand, 

 they made enormous bags of geese and swans, some- 

 thing which no one can regret, since the geese and the 

 swans at Currituck Sound are so numerous that they 

 eat up vast quantities of the food which might better be 

 consumed by the ducks. There are men long familiar 

 with these waters who declare that the geese and the 

 swans are constantly becoming more and more abund- 

 ant and that ultimately they will occupy these waters 

 to the exclusion of more desirable fowl. This, however, 

 is not likely to occur in our time, and the prophecy may 

 be classed with another, made twenty years ago by one 

 of the most eminent ornithologists of this country, who 

 declared that fifteen years from that time the blue-peter 

 would be the game bird of Currituck Sound. The years 

 have come and the years have gone, but there are still 

 a few canvas-backs left, and it is possible that when our 

 children tie out in Currituck Sound in just the right 

 weather they, too, may kill a few of these glorious 

 birds." 



The food of the canvas-back, from which it takes its 

 specific name, and to which it owes its delicious flavor, 

 is the so-called wild celery, which is really a water grass. 

 It grows both in fresh and brackish w^ater, and is 

 common at various points along the sea-coast, and also 

 in the fresh waters of the interior. 



This plant, like many others, has a variety of com- 

 mon names. Some of the most familiar in different 

 localities are "tape grass," from the tape-like appear- 

 ance of the long leaves; "channel weed," as it fre- 



