BIRDS OF INDIANA. 683 



Greencastle, April 6, 1894 (Earlle), and the earliest for the White- 

 water Valley is from Brookville, April 28, 1883. In 1885, 1890, 1892 

 and 1896 the first record from Indiana was on the same date each year, 

 though in 1892 Mr. Parker had reported.it from Cook County, Illinois, 

 May 2. During the migration they are often caught in barnyards, 

 chicken yards, fenced town lots and other places where the fences are 

 rather tightly built. Whether this is due to the fact that they are 

 attracted there or during their nocturnal flight they are generally dis- 

 tributed, and the others pass on, leaving those only which cannot get 

 away, it is impossible to tell. 



Judging from their numbers in some swamps, I should think them 

 much more common migrants in southern Indiana than we generally 

 suppose. During the breeding season their numbers vary in different 

 localities. Some places they are by no means common and in others 

 they breed abundantly. Mr. Nelson says of it in Cook County, 

 Illinois: "Abundant summer resident everywhere in the marshes and 

 the larger prairie sloughs; generally has a full set of eggs, numbering 

 from seven tp twelve, the first week of June," (Birds of Northwestern 

 Illinois, p. 135). In Lake County both Mr. Toppan and Mr. Parker 

 note it as common, and the last-named gentleman says of it about 

 George and Wolf lakes: "The boys collect hundreds of their eggs 

 every year." It is found in the rank slough grass bordering the lakes, 

 and rarely takes to wing when approached. 



Mr. C. E. Aiken informs me in May, 1871, in Lake County, he 

 found it breeding very abundantly, but it appearedjrare at Whitewater 

 in 1886, 1887 and 1889. 



In Starke County, at English Lake, it breeds in limited numbers 

 (Deane, Dury). Also, at Davis Station (Coale). In one locality in 

 that county Mr. Joseph E. Gould found the nests of the Pied-billed 

 "Grebe, Coot and Florida Gallinule, full sets of which were taken July 

 1, 1891. One nest of the Gallinule contained thirteen eggs. It has 

 also been observed breeding in Dekalb County (Mrs. Hine, E. W. 

 McBride); Vigo County (Evermann). The summer of 1897 it was not 

 found at English Lake in the numbers usually observed (Deane). I 

 take the liberty of giving Dr. Langdon's excellent account of its breed- 

 ing habits as observed the week ending July 4, 1890, in Ottawa 

 'County, Ohio, where it breeds abundantly: "The nests are situated 

 amongst the 'saw grass' and constructed of dried blades. Their height 

 varies, some almost resting on the water, while others are placed afloat 

 or more above it, and have an incline eight or ten inches in width, made 

 of dried grass, extending from the nest to the water's edge, which 

 makes them a conspicuous object when the surrounding vegetation is 



