THE OOLOGIST. 



77 



The Boat-tailed Grackle [Quiscalus 

 imajor) is a bird woi'thy of much study. 

 It is a resident and well known here 

 and commonly called the 'Choc" (Eng- 

 lish "Chough") by the Creoles, perhaps 

 from one of its numerous and character- 

 istic notes, or perhaps as a contraction 

 of a word similar to that above. In 

 winter, the Boat-tails are seen around 

 the city in large, noisy flocks, which 

 blacken the ground with their numbers 

 in their favorite pastures. Towards 

 spring these flocks break up and go to 

 some nearby marsh to breed, usually in 

 colonies of from ten to a hundred pair. 

 The male Boat-tail is a very handsome 

 bird, with glossy purple, green and 

 black feathers and clear yellow eyes. 

 And the female is conpicuously plain, 

 being a uniform, rusty, dingy brown. 

 The male has a seeming endless variety 

 ■of notes, and is without doubt the nois- 

 iest bird in the marsh in mating time, 

 keeping up an incessant clatter of call 

 and alarm notes, occasionally swelling 

 his throat to utter a grotesque song to 

 his intended. The colonies are usually 

 found on the banks of some secluded 

 water course, the nests being built of 

 ■dead grass which has laid in water and 

 mud. This the bird brings wet from 

 the marsh, and shapes it, with the mud 

 clinging to it, into a substantial, though 

 ugly structure, about six inches outside 

 and four inches inside diameter, and 

 about three and a half inches deep in- 

 side. 



The bird builds in sawgrass, in reeds, 

 in a clump of the hollow cane-like 

 grasses, in short, in any kind of marsh 

 grasses or reed strong enough to sup- 

 port the nest, sometimes between wil- 

 low saplings, and usually from two to 

 four feet above the level of the water or 

 the ground. 



Like all Grackles, Quiscalus major is 

 •essentially gregarious, and colonies of 

 from twenty-five to fifty pair are most 

 common. In Lake Catouatchie, some 

 twelve miles from this city, I found a 



little islet of sawgrass, about eight feet 

 in diameter, and about 150 feet from 

 shore, which contained- nine nests of 

 Boat-tail, all with eggs or young, and 

 two nests of the Least Bittern, one with 

 eggs, the other with young. 



The Grackle colony chooses a new 

 site each year, usually quite close to the 

 old one. Many double nests are found 

 and some that look as though three 

 nests were built one on the other. Of 

 these the majority are empty, though a 

 few contain eggs. I do not know why 

 the birds build these double nests and 

 think that perhaps a new nest is built 

 on the old one in raising the second 

 brood, as nearly all the nests of this 

 character were old nests. 



The birds appear quite solicitous of 

 their young and eggs and usually make 

 a fuss when one approaches the nest. 

 Eggs may be found as early as April 

 15th, and on May 6th many nests con- 

 tained young almost fully fledged. The 

 majority of the nests contained three 

 eggs, some only two, and many had a 

 single young. Of several hundred nests 

 examined, not one contained over three 

 eggs, so I conclude that three is the 

 average set here. The eggs in color and 

 markings, look like exaggerated speci- 

 mens of the eggs of the Baltimore Oriole. 

 In most of them the shell is smooth, 

 with a ground of a bluish tint with 

 spots, lines, blotches and scrawls of 

 various shades of umber and black, most 

 prominent at the larger end, snd pur- 

 plish shell marks of a similar character. 

 In a few specimens the ground color 

 is a brownish drab, instead of blue. 

 The pigment washes off very easily 

 when the eggs are fresh, so that it is 

 best not to use too much water in blow- 

 ing. The eggs vary greatly, the aver- 

 age specimen being a long ovate ia 

 shape, and in size about 1.18 x .87. 

 Beta, 

 New Orleans, La. 



