ELEVENTH ANNUAL REPORT. 



151 



CAKULl.N A ALl,i( .a i i >k. 



"Xests were found in considerable numbers as early as June 

 8th, but no eggs were laid in any of them until the end of the 

 dry period, which occurred nearly two weeks later. Almost im- 

 mediately after the occurrence of the rains that filled up the 

 swamps, eggs were deposited in all of the nests at about the same 

 time. From the fact that all of these completed nests had stood 

 for so long a time without eggs, and from the fact that all of the 

 eggs from these nests contained embryos in a well advanced state 

 of development, it seemed evident that the egg-laying had been 

 delayed b}- the unusually dry weather. Eggs taken direct from 

 the oviducts of the alligator that was killed at this time also con- 

 tained embryos that had already passed through the earlier 

 stages of development. Thus it was that the earlier stages of 

 development were not obtained during this summer." 



On August 12. 1900. the writer discovered an alligator's nest 

 close to a causeway (an ancient rice ditch) in Hampton County, 

 South Carolina. It consisted of a mound of decomposing veg- 

 etable matter about five feet in diameter and three feet high, half 

 hidden among some bushes at the border of a pool. At one side of 

 the nest, inward toward its center fully two feet, protruded two 



