THE 00L0QI8T 



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129 



Bird Life Around Lake Heyes, 

 Louisiana, June 7th and 8th, 1917 



Lake Hayes, Louisiana, is an arti- 

 ficial lake on the Texas & Pacific 

 Railroad in Caddo Parish, between 

 the cities of Marshall, Texas and 

 Shreveport. Louisiana; and ten 

 miles west of Shreveport. 



The land about the lake is rolling 

 and open, the nearest woods being 

 about a mile; however there is a mar- 

 gin of button Willows and Willow 

 trees around the lake, and the bird 

 life around the grassy, bushy edges is 

 plentiful. 



During the two days that I was here 

 I saw many birds and found a good 

 many of their nests. The Red-Wing- 

 ed Black Birds were the most abund- 

 ant and many of their nests were 

 found which usually contained eith- 

 er well incubated eggs or young birds; 

 the nests were as usual made of the 

 broad leaves of the marsh grass, wov- 

 en tightly together and placed abou": 

 three or four feet above the water 

 in a Button Willow of other bush. 



King birds were also found in 

 abundance and were very noisy, how- 

 ever only one of their nests was 

 found which was in a Button Willow 

 tree about three feet above the wat- 

 er. This, rather bulky nest, contain- 

 ed two fresh eggs and the bird was 

 on the nest when it was found. 



Near this nest was a nest of the 

 Orchard Oriole that contained four 

 warm eggs but the birds were not 

 seen or heard. 



Other birds seen around the lake 

 while on this trip were Black Crown- 

 ed Night Herons, Turkey and Black 

 Vultures, Yellow-Breasted Chats, 

 Maryland Yellow-Throats, Cardinals, 

 and White and red-eyed Vireos. 



DeLoach Martin. 



seemed to be up to date in every re- 

 spect, I was surprised in looking over 

 the collection of birds' eggs to find 

 that the ones on exhibition were blown 

 with two holes through the center. 

 R. B. Overington, 

 San Francisco, Cal. 



While at Honolulu last winter and 

 going through the Museum which 



Breeding of the Black Crowned Night 

 Herons In 1880 and 1881 



We first found the Herons nesting 

 on the ground on Horrcon Marsh. We 

 visited the grounds on June 4th, 1881 

 and took a boat and went five or six 

 miles in open water to the nesting 

 place. The nests then were generally 

 built in burnt holes where the fire had 

 burned the sod out some previous dry 

 season and partly filled up. They oc- 

 cupied a strip of marsh about twenty 

 rods wide and about a half mile long. 

 The nests were usually built of cat 

 all, some coarse grass and a few had 

 a foundation of sticks. We did not 

 try to count them but I guess two hun- 

 dred pair were nesting there then. I 

 was told by the trapers that the 

 Herons had left their old nesting 

 ground and were probably west of the 

 island. 



On June 3rd, 1881 we took a boat 

 and crossed the open water about a 

 mile and then had to walk on a fioat- 

 ing rod and went west a mile or two 

 to some groves of willow and poplar 

 and found them nesting there. The 

 nests were built of sticks from six to 

 twelve feet from the ground and from 

 one to three nests in a tree or bush. 

 We examined a hundred nests. Two 

 nests contained six eggs, seven had 

 five. Thirty-seven had four, thirty-six 

 had three, twelve had two and seven 

 had one. Under a good many of the 

 nests were one or two eggs or shells. 



The nests were in two groves of 

 three or four acres. We made an esti- 

 mate of the nests by counting part of 

 them and found about two hundred 



