The Audubon Societies 257 



ceding orders, but we find a few grasses, feathers, seaweed, sticks, reeds, rootlets or 

 pebbles used in their construction. 



V. The Lamellirostral Swimmers, or Ducks, Geese and Swans, make up a large 

 order of widely distributed species, whose nesting-sites are more various than the 

 materials used in making their simple nests. 



Holes in trees or cliffs, depressions on the ground among rocks or scrubby bushes 

 near water, hollow trees or stumps, secluded nooks in high grass or reeds or even brush, 

 sometimes far from water, or in short prairie grass, beneath rose-bushes, in reeds over 

 water, or merely a hollow on dried grass, are congenial sites selected by species of 

 this order. 



The outer part of the nest, if any is made, may be of twigs, leaves, grasses or moss, 

 or of reeds, lined, in some cases, with down. Curiously enough, one species prefers a 

 lining of white down, while another plucks gray down from its breast to furnish the 

 desired material. 



VI. The Long-Legged Ducks, or Flamingoes, nest in colonies on mud flats, laying 

 their single egg in a slight depression formed on the top of a regular, truncated cone of 

 mud, which is built up some eight to fourteen inches from the ground. 



VII. Spoonbills, Herons, Ibises and Bitterns vary considerably in nesting-habits; 

 for we find the nests of some in tall trees, in marshes only 2}^ feet over water, in man- 

 grove bushes, in reedy marshes, in trees and bushes of medium height, or on the ground, 

 the latter being restricted usually to secluded islets. 



A platform of sticks suits the Spoonbills, Herons and Storks, while the Ibises prefer 

 a nest of reeds and weed-stalks, and the Bitterns a nest of rushes, plant-stems, grasses 

 or, in one instance, of willow twigs lined with maiden cane leaves. 



VIII. As might be expected, The Paludicolse, or Marsh-birds, seek nesting-sites 

 about marshes or near water, sometimes choosing a bush or small tree, or a secluded 

 nook in rushes over water, sometimes restricting their nesting-area to fresh-water or to 

 salt-water. Grasses, reed-stalks, roots, leaves, twigs, or simple platforms of weed- 

 stalks, are used in the construction of the nests, showing little advance over those of the 

 three preceding orders. 



IX. The Shore-birds, or Limicolae, although forming one of the largest orders of 

 our native birds, show less dissimilarity in their nesting-habits than the members of some 

 of the smaller orders. As a rule, all of the shore-birds nest on the ground except one 

 species, which uses the abandoned nests of Robins, Grackles, Waxwings and other tree- 

 building species. We find the nesting-site in various places, near woods, in marshy 

 places or in grassy marshes, in the grass itself, on dry ground, near fresh or salt water as 

 the preference of the species may be. The nests of these birds are very simple, being 

 slight depressions in the ground, or very scanty structures of dry leaves, grasses, stones 

 or moss. 



X. With the transition to land-birds, in Order X, we find about the same simple 

 method of building among the Gallina, although these birds have easy access to a variety 

 of nesting-material. Hollows in grasses or moss or on the ground, filled in with leaves 

 and feathers, make up their nests, which we may look for near or beneath bushes, at 

 the base of stumps, sometimes in oak woods in the sprouts around stumps, often shel- 

 tered by overhanging limbs, or in the far north in dwarf bushes or patches of sedge in 

 the vast expanses of a tundra. 



XI. The Columba, or Doves and Pigeons, although building on or near the ground 

 (sometimes in trees), make loose platforms of sticks or small twigs, resembling the 

 nests of Herons in type, though their nests are not so large, and are perhaps rather more 

 neatly built. 



XII. A new kind of nesting-site is found among the Raptores, that is, holes in trees 

 and dead stubs; but these cavities are not shaped with the care and nicety exhibited by 



