166 ODD HOURS WITH NATURE 



a remarkable adaptation of habit. Its closest 

 affinities are the members of the thrush group, 

 not one of which in this country manifests the 

 smallest approach to fitness for an aquatic life. 

 But in America there are birds of the same order 

 as the dipper which seem to exhibit a stage in 

 the process by which its very complete water habits 

 have been acquired. These water thrushes find 

 their livelihood chiefly by wading in the shallow 

 margins of streams and picking up the aquatic 

 insects and larvae to be found there. They, so 

 to speak, have begun to exploit a place in nature 

 left blank by their own kin. The dippers have 

 gone a stage farther, exploiting 1 the blank place 

 more fully and making it their own. 



