WATER-BIRD WAIFS 



shot for terms of years, and this should be done in all. 

 A few pairs still remain in the locality where I live, 

 and it is very interesting to run across them from time 

 to time. They feed in the ponds and swamps, but 

 when it comes to nesting, they are very different from 

 the Black Duck, for they resort to hollow trees, and 

 apparently are liable to go almost anywhere. Their 

 favorite choice seems to be an old hollow apple tree in 

 an orchard. In certain orchards they nest year after 

 year. Becoming familiar with man, particularly if 

 not disturbed, they grow very bold and select the 

 strangest sort of places for nesting-sites. 



By all odds the most remarkable incident of this 

 sort in my experience was when a pair selected a barn. 

 The female would go through a broken clapboard into 

 the hayloft. Scooping a hollow in the top of the hay- 

 mow, she lined it with her down and laid ten eggs. 

 While she was laying, the owner of the place would 

 see the happy pair at daybreak perched on the ridge- 

 pole of the barn, making love. In another barn a nest 

 was begun, but the birds were driven off. Another 

 pair chose a hollow in a maple tree bordering the road, 

 within a few rods of a house. The hole was only about 

 five feet from the ground, and most of the neighbors 

 knew of the nest, and would look in as they went by. 

 Still another odd nesting-site came to my notice. Near 

 where I live a farmer had a pig-pen just back of his 

 house, and in it grew a hollow apple tree. On the 

 eleventh of April this tree was cut down, and it was 

 265 



