OPEN NESTS 155 



the ordinary observer of bird life. These birds, all 

 the world over, are dwellers in wet localities, marshes, 

 swamps, and dense thickets of reeds and other vegeta- 

 tion on the banks of rivers, broads and ponds. Their 

 open nests are generally well concealed amongst such 

 vegetation, and owing to the wet or damp nature of 

 the ground are bulky structures. They are formed of 

 rushes, flags, reeds, and dry grasses, the finer materials 

 being used to line the flat shallow cavity containing 

 the eggs. The foundation of many of these nests is 

 under shallow water, the birds piling up materials 

 from the bottom and forming the nest proper when 

 the structure has been raised above the level of the 

 surrounding water. Other nests are literally floating 

 in water too deep for such a preliminary preparation, 

 large rafts of dead and rotten aquatic vegetation upon 

 which a dry^er stratum of materials supports the egg 

 cavity at the top. These nests are often ingeniously 

 moored to the stems of reeds and flags and other 

 plants, the materials being deftly wound round them. 

 The bulk of some of these aquatic nests is enormous. 

 Nests of the Giant Coot (Fulica gigantea), found in 

 Chili, are described by Mr Ambrose Lane as composed 

 of materials enough to fill a horse-cart, the part above 

 water being about one yard in diameter. Another 

 species {F. leucoptera) breeding in the same country 

 also builds a floating nest. We shall also find that 

 these raft-like homes are made by distantly related 

 birds of another order but with similar conditions of 



