WATER BIRDS. 145 
cloudy and rainy weather. Its loud and unmusical squawk suggests at 
the same time the croak of the bull-frog and the call of a young crow. 
The nest is carelessly built of twigs and small sticks, usually placed 
from eight to thirty feet from the ground and not necessarily close to 
water; we have known it to be built in orchard trees and shade trees at 
least a quarter of a mile from water, although it is more often found in the 
low trees and swampy thickets which 
directly border streams and ponds. 3 
The eggs are three to six, blue, un- a is 
spotted, and average 1.50 by 1.14 
inches. 
Ordinarily the nests are widely 
scattered, but more rarely a small 
colony of three to six pairs may be 
found. Dr. Morris Gibbs visited five 
nests of this kind found “in willow 
bushes near a creek, from 4 to 10 feet 
from the ground” in Kalamazoo Co., 
in May, 1878. 
The food is varied, but in addition | 
to the usual fish and frogs it eats large _, BieeS% Boot of Green Heron. 
. Showing partly bare tibia and pectinate middle 
numbers of insects, not always aqua- claw. (OFeinal) 
tic. Onetaken at New Haven, Conn., 
“had the stomach filled principally with little salt-marsh minnows, and 
in addition contained an eel, some kind of a water bug, several grasshop- 
pers and two spiders” (Buck, Nidiologist, III, 37). One killed at Boone- 
ville, N. Y., had the stomach “filled with grasshoppers.” 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Adult: Entire top of head dark lustrous green, blackish in front; back and upper 
surface of wings and tail green of nearly the same shade as top of head, the elongated, 
narrow interscapulars often with a bluish-white gloss and the slender shafts pure white; 
most of the wing-coverts narrowly margined with yellowish-white; chin and upper throat 
white, scarcely streaked; median line of middle and lower throat striped brown and white; 
entire sides of head and neck rich dark chestnut with a purplish gloss at the back; remainder 
of under parts smoky-gray; primaries slaty-blue; iris yellow; bill brownish-black above, 
greenish-white below; legs and feet green. Sexes alike. Young somewhat like the adult 
but with little clear chestnut or green; everywhere streaked with light and dark, and the 
wing-coverts with much broader light edgings than in the adult. Length 15.50 to 22.50 
inches; wing 6.30 to 8.00; culmen 2 to 2.55; tarsus 1.75 to 2.15. 
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