4 
OBSERVATIONS ON CANADIAN BIRDS. 135 
piper, which stays with us during the summer, rearing its young on 
the shores of the bay. 
Of the Heron family we have four species: viz, the Great Blue 
Heron, the Black-crowned Night Heron, and the greater and lesser 
Bitterns. Much information has yet to be gained regarding the birds 
of this class. Being all more or less night feeders, the study of 
their habits is attended with peculiar difficulty. On the breast of the 
great blue heron, covered by the long plumage of the neck is a tuft 
of soft tumid feathers, which, when exposed in the dark emit a pale 
phosphorescent light. The use of this does not yet appear to be fully 
understood, though the fishermen aver that when the heron retires at 
night to his feeding ground, he wades knee deep in the water, and 
shewing this light attracts the fish within his reach, much in the same 
way as the Indian does when fixing the torch of pitch-pine on the 
bow or his canoe. 
Of the flocks of the larger water-fowl which periodically pass along 
on their migratory course, only a very few now visit us; occasionally, 
in thick or stormy weather a few stragglers alight on the bay to rest 
and recruit themselves, though they generally forfeit their lives by so 
doing. Last fall three specimens of the American Swan were thus 
procured, and a single individual of what has hitherto been considered 
the young of the Snow Goose was also obtained ; doubts still exist as 
to the identity of the latter bird, some writers maintaining that it is 
a separate and distinct species, while others declare it to be the young 
of the snow goose in immature plumage. There are good arguments on 
both sides, but conclusive information on the subject can only be 
obtained from their breeding grounds in the far north. 
Of Ducks I have noticed in the market and elsewhere, twenty 
different species, the gayest of which is the Wood-duck, so called - 
from its habit of building its nest in the hollow of a decayed tree. A 
few pairs of this species annually raise their broods near the shores 
of the Dundas marsh ; the Teal and the Mallard have also been ob- 
served leading out their young from the ready inlets of the Bay, but 
there are exceptional cases, as the great body pass farther to the north, 
paying us a short visit going and returning.* 
* It has been remarked by fishermen and others, who have had occasion to be on the 
waters of the Bay during the summer months, that there are usually about a dozen ducks 
which keep together in a small flock, and do not seem to take any share in the duties of the 
breeding season. The flock is composed of both sexes, and frequently of different species. 
Various conjectures have been formed as to the causé of this singular conduct, but the 
