110 GAME BIRDS, WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



where no better site can be found, but have never seen one 

 so situated. The height of the nesting site above the ground 

 or water varies from three feet, or even less, to forty or more. 

 The bird is able to so compress her body that she can squeeze 

 into a very small hole, but when the entrance is of a size to 

 accommodate her easily, she appears to fly directly into it, 

 striking the plumage of her breast against the lower edge of 

 the entrance to break the force and speed of her descent. 



When the young are hatched they are soon pushed out or 

 fall out, and if the nest is favorably situated they drop upon 

 the water. If the nest is some distance from the water the 

 process of getting the young to it varies with individual birds. 

 I have questioned people who claim to have seen the opera- 

 tion, and am convinced that the mother usually takes the 

 young in her bill and flies with them to the water. Thirteen 

 Massachusetts correspondents state that she carries them. 

 In one instance a bird, presumably a Wood Duck, was seen 

 to push her young out of a nest. They dropped about forty 

 feet to the grass, apparently unharmed, and she then led them 

 to the river. In another case a Maine guide reports that he 

 saw a Wood Duck fly down and alight in the water, and that 

 several young, which seemed to be clinging to her back, all 

 fell ofl^ into the water as she alighted on the surface. Mr. 

 Lyman Pearson of Newbury, Mass., says that he saw a Wood 

 Duck once carry her young to the water. He thought that 

 she carried them on her feathers. The destruction of the 

 large and heavy timber does away with many a hollow limb, 

 and the wood-cutter has been one factor in the decrease of 

 the Wood Duck. Mr. J. J. Coburn of Worcester told me 

 years ago that he once found a female of this species dead in 

 a stovepipe leading from a stove in his boat-building estab- 

 lishment at Lake Quinsigamond. The bird had entered the 

 pipe easily when looking for a nesting site, but could not get 

 out, and I have heard of other similar cases. Dr. John C. 

 Phillips of Wenham, Mass., says that a female Wood Duck 

 came down a chimney of his camp at Wenham and was found 

 dead inside, and he has heard of another instance of the same 

 sort. A few nesting boxes put up in the trees about a pond 



