56 Wayne, South Carolina Birds. [jan. 



A CONTRIBUTION TO THE ORNITHOLOGY OF 



SOUTH CAROLINA, CHIEFLY THE 



COAST REGION. 



BY ARTHUR T. WAYNE. 



Podilymbus podiceps. Pied-billed Grebe. — An abundant 

 resident, breeding in freshwater ponds or large rice field 'back- 

 waters' where the water is generally from four to ten feet deep. 

 The number of eggs ranges from six to eight, and incubation 

 begins as early as the first week in April in some forward seasons. 

 After the breeding season is over both young and adult betake 

 themselves to the salt water creeks, — very rarely going as far as 

 the inlets. During the breeding season, the principle food of this 

 species is leeches. 



Anas obscura rubripes. Red-legged Black Duck. — A 

 common winter and early spring resident; arriving the last week 

 in November and remaining until the last week in March. It 

 is always outnumbered by obscura, and examples of both forms 

 are commonly shot from the same flock. Professional gunners 

 make no distinction between the two forms — rubripes being 

 considered the very adult of Alias obscura. 



Tantalus loculator. Wood Ibis. — A few individuals winter 

 regularly as far north as Lat. 33°. From the middle of June until 

 the last of October, enormous flocks, composed entirely of young 

 birds, are to be seen daily on the sound in front of my house. At 

 times the Wood Ibis is very unsuspicious and confiding. I have 

 seen one of these birds deliberately follow a boat as long as fish 

 were being thrown to it, one at a time, which the ibis devoured 

 ravenously. This species breeds in some numbers in Caw-Caw 

 swamp, Colleton County. 



Botaurus lentiginosus. American Bittern. — During the 

 months of May, June, and July, 1887, I saw several pairs of these 

 birds in an enormous 'back-water' near Yemassee, S. O, where 

 the Purple Gallinule (Jonornis martinica) was breeding in large 

 numbers, but despite all my exertions I was unable to find a nest, 

 although the young birds were seen in June. In 1890, I again 



