WATERFOWL IIT NEBRASKA. 



15 



Watee Bikds Observed Octobee 5-12, 1915. 



GAME BIEDS. 



NONGAME BIEDS. 



Horned grebe. 



American eared grebe. 



Pied-billed- grebe. 



Loon. 



Ring-billed gull. 



Franklin gull. 



Forster tern. 



American bittern. 



Great blue heron. 



Black-crowned night heron. 



Killdeer. 



Hooded merganser. 

 Mallard. 

 Gadwall. 

 Baldpate. 



Green-winged teal. 

 Blue-winged teal. 

 Shoveller. 

 Pintail. 

 Redhead. 

 Canvas-back. 

 Lesser scaup duck. 

 Bufflehead. 

 Ruddy duck. 

 Little brown crane. 

 Sandhill crane. 

 American coot. 

 Wilson snipe. 



LAKES AT THE HEAD OF THE NORTH LOUP KIVER. 



The group of lakes at the head of the North Lou]3 Eiver comprises 

 fibout 20 bodies of water, in general character very similar to those 

 of eastern Cherry County. They lie within an area of 30 miles east 

 and west and about 10 miles north and south; and, with the ex- 

 ception of the westernmost, are relatively close together, most of 

 them from a quarter of a mile to 3 miles apart. The greater num- 

 ber are permanent, though without outlets and therefore more or 

 less alkaline; a few, such as Brush Lake, Mud Lake, and Jumbo 

 Lake, drain into the North Loup Eiver. Nearty all are relatively 

 small, not over a mile or two in length, several of them even less 

 than half a mile long. Silver Lake, 'Red Willow Lake, Wliite Wil- 

 low Lake, and 'Speckelmire Lake, all of \^hich are excellent duck 

 lakes, have little or no marsh about their borders, and some of these, 

 particularly Silver Lake, have partially sandy shores. The Twin 

 Lakes and Mud Lake have a great part of their margins more or 

 less sandy, and are almost deserted by ducks during the summer. 

 Three of the lakes once having the greatest extent of marsh, and there- 

 fore furnishing excellent cover for breeding waterfowl, namely, Brush, 

 Scott Pullman, and Jumbo, have been ditched and drained for the 

 purpose of utilizing their valleys as hay meadows. Some of the 

 other lakes, however, have more or less marsh that is attractive to 

 water birds. 



Water birds are here fairly plentiful in summer, though on ac- 

 count of the small number of lakes and the draining of some of the 

 best of these, the region is not of so much importance as either the 

 eastern Cherry County group or the lakes of Garden and Morrill 



