33 6 



The Crane-like Birds 



wings being white, with black primaries and secondaries, and dark brownish 

 red tertiaries. The three known species are distinguished mainly on differences 

 in the color and configuration of the bare spaces on the head. They occur in 

 pairs or small parties, nesting in marshes and laying two usually bluish white 

 unspotted eggs. Their habits are otherwise similar to those of other Cranes. 



The Courlans (Subfamily Aramince}. These are large Rail-like birds that 

 were formerly placed directly with the Rails, which they closely resemble in 

 external appearance, but when their anatomy came to be more carefully 

 studied it was found that the whole skeleton, as well as the arrangement 



of the feather tracts, was distinctly Crane- 

 like, the texture of the plumage and the 

 form of the wings being the only essen- 

 tially Rail-like features. A single genus 

 (Aramus) of two closely related species are 

 the only representatives, these being from 

 twenty-four to about twenty-eight inches 

 in length, with a slender, compressed bill 

 nearly five inches long, both mandibles of 

 which are decurved and turned slightly to 

 one side at the tip, the latter as a result, 

 it is said, of forcing the bill into the spiral 

 opening of a certain land shell on which 

 they largely feed. The legs are long and 

 naked from the middle of the tibia, while 

 the wings are broad and rounded, with the 

 first quill scarcely longer than the tenth. 

 The prevailing color of the plumage is 

 dark brown, varying from a chocolate to 

 an olive shade, with the head and neck 

 and sometimes the back, wing-coverts, and 

 lower parts striped or spotted longitudi- 

 nally with white. 



The Florida Courlan, Limpkin, or Cry- 

 ing-bird (-4. giganleus], as it is variously 

 called, is found in Central America and the 



West Indies, whence it ranges north to the Florida peninsula and the Rio 

 Grande valley. It is known from the other species by the more general 

 distribution of the white stripes over the body. In the Southern or Brazilian 

 Courlan (A. scolo paceus] of eastern South America, the white markings 

 are confined to the neck and head. Both species frequent the borders 

 of swamps and marshy rivers, feeding largely upon mollusks, the shells of 

 which they often pierce with their iron-like bills. The following account of 

 the habits of the Southern Courlan is from the pen of W. H. Hudson, who 

 observed them in Argentina: " By day the Courlan is a dull bird, concealing 

 itself in dense reed-beds in streams and marshes. When driven up he rises 



FlG. 109. Brazilian Courlan, Aramus 

 scolopacens. 



