ELEVEN IMPORTANT WILD-DUCK FOODS. 7 



THALIA. 



VALUE AS DUCK FOOD. 



The writer's only experience with, thalia (species divaricata) as a 

 wild-duck food was on St. Vincent Island, Florida. Here a slough 

 filled with a tall growth of these elegant plants was a favorite resort 

 of ducks, especially mallards, which could always be flushed from 



Fig. 4. — Range of frogbit. 



this place. However, at the time of the writer's visit only one 

 bird was obtained and its stomach contained a few thalia seeds. 

 Another mallard collected at a later date in the same place, by the 

 late Dr. R. V. Pierce, had fed almost exclusively on these large seeds, 

 and its gullet and gizzard were well filled by 144 entire seeds and 

 fragments of others. 



The evidence is sufficient to show that thalia has great possibilities 

 as a wild-duck food. The seeds are large and nutritious and are 



