THE COOT. 255 



From the varied climate and supply of food in the places 

 which they haunt, and especially of those in which they are 

 bred, they vary considerably in size, so that a coot of one 

 part of the country might, according to circumstances, appear 

 either a giant or a pigmy among coots of another. They 

 are all, however, so much alike in their form and plumage, 

 that they can hardly be mistaken. There is little difference 

 in the plumage of the sexes, in that of the old and the young, 

 or in the breeding time and the rest of the year. 



The size is nearly the same as that of a common fowl 

 (though the standard is in that case as variable as the thing 

 measured). The average length is about eighteen inches ; 

 the extent of the wings about twenty-eight ; and the weight* 

 from a pound and a half to two pounds. 



The bill is of moderate length, straight, strong, conical, 

 compressed, deeper than it is broad at the base ; the exterior 

 of the upper mandible dilated into a plate or shield on the 

 forehead, which is considerably larger in the male than in 

 the female, and forms one of the external means of distin- 

 guishing them. Towards the tip, the exterior of the upper 

 mandible is arched, but it does not project beyond or hang 

 over the under one. In the breeding season, the bill is pale 

 yellowish red, increasing to bright red on the frontal plate 

 or shield ; but when the breeding season is over, the colours 

 of these parts are reversed ; the plate is then white, and 

 though the red on the bill has also faded, it looks darker 

 from the contrast with the colour of the plate. The birds 

 conceal themselves in the breeding season, and are conse- 

 quently most frequently seen when the frontal plate is white ; 

 it is on that account that they are called bald coots. 



The general tint of the upper plumage is black, pure on 

 the head and nape, but marked with less or more of dusky 

 and obscure ash on the other parts. The under part is dusky 

 ash, paler on the belly, and there is a white line on the bend 



