26 THE BIRDS 
Kansas and arrived in poor condition. They did not, 
however, lay a full clutch or set. The nest is a well- 
concealed affair of grasses and down, placed in a slight 
hollow in the ground. Fresh eggs May 20th; six to ten 
in number, a dark gray color. Size, 2.20x1.50. Only 
one brood a season. 
GENus AIX. 
[144]. Aix sponsa (Linneus). Wood Duck. 
[Summer Duck]. 
Raner.—Temperate North America. Breeds from 
southern British Columbia, central Saskatchewan, northern 
Ontario, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia south to central 
California, southern Texas, Florida, and Cuba; winters 
chiefly in the United States from southern British 
Columbia, Kansas, Illinois, Indiana, Pennsylvania, and 
New Jersey south to southern California and the Gulf 
of Mexico; accidental in Bermuda, Mexico, Jamaica, and 
Europe. 
This bird, the most beautiful of all the waterfowl 
breeding within our limits, is fast becoming killed out by 
the early shooting in the fall, and the timber being cut 
off, both in the progress of cleaning up the farm lands, 
and the timber craze which has gone over our Tidewater 
section within the last ten years or so. The opening of 
the season, September 15th, is far too early to shoot these 
birds as game, while the plumage of the male, at least, 
should shame any one from killing and plucking another 
to eat, if from no other reason. Even in their wild state 
