WATCHING THE DAY DIE 231 



deed it is small wonder that their whistle gets 

 twisted and rattles a good deal. Thanks to their 

 weird, far-reaching whistle, they are the noisiest 

 birds on the lake in summer, and a stiff contrast 

 to their smaller grebe cousins, the eared, Hol- 

 boells, or pied-billed species. Now their shrill 

 cries floated up over the water from a dozen lo- 

 cations, and the glasses soon picked up the 

 makers of the weird calls. They were in little 

 groups of twos and threes, old and well-grown 

 young. The old birds were diving assiduously 

 in the pursuit of food, most probably fish, and 

 the youngsters were begging for the produce of 

 their parents' labors. 



A young Western or swan grebe has an orig- 

 inal manner of begging, one that is distinctly his 

 own. Almost all fledglings of the land-birds 

 beg alike, by drooping their wings and thrust- 

 ing their body forward while extending a gap- 

 ing mouth, but the gebe cannot assume this 

 posture, possibly for the reason that he cannot 

 stand on the water. The way of one youngster 

 noted was as follows: When his mother dived, 

 he tried to puzzle out in his narrow head where 

 she was most likely to reappear and made haste 

 to reach the spot. Sometimes he guessed fairly 



