CHAPTER X 



THE KINGFISHERS AND THEIR KING ROW 



THE Kingfisher has a strong attachment for particular nest- 

 ing places, and will occupy the same bank for years, if 

 unmolested, and sometimes even when robbed. The Belted 

 Kingfisher, though widely distributed, seems to be nowhere 

 very abundant. In New Hampshire one rarely finds more than 

 a single pair nesting in the neighborhood of any village or town. 



The nest now to be described was drilled into a sand bank 

 beside a country road. It had a straight four-inch bore, which 

 four feet from the opening expanded into a low-vaulted chamber 

 six inches high and ten inches across. When this dark sub- 

 terranean abode was opened at the rear, on the nineteenth day 

 of July, 1900, I put in my hand and drew forth in succession five 

 very strange-looking creatures. They had huge conical bills, 

 short legs, and fat squatty bodies, which bristled all over with 

 steel-gray "quills," the feather-tubes, which had not yet burst, 

 suggesting an antediluvian monster or reptilian bird on a re- 

 duced scale. 



These five young Kingfishers which were then about nine 

 days old had already acquired some curious habits. They, like 

 the adult birds, stand not on the toes simply, but on the whole 

 tarsus, which corresponds to the scaly part of the leg of a fowl, 

 so that the "drum-stick" rises from the heel. They can be 

 posed in any position like toy soldiers, but if placed in line they 

 will soon break ranks and walk backwards, even moving up in- 

 clined planes or against obstacles set in their paths. They are 

 rarely seen to take a single forward step for many days after 

 reaching this stage. 



136 



