THE BALD EAGLE. 277 



I found it still alive. One peculiar thing about this bird was that it never 

 learned to fly, though it was not confined during the first year. Its wings 

 lid not grow to the proper length and the feathers on them were twisted 

 in all directions. It had a very rough and dilapidated appearance generally, 

 which I cannot account for, as it was never handled much. While not 

 afraid of man, this bird was a great coward in other respects, and would 

 run from any other animal of whatever size; even a chicken would greatly 

 frighten it. 



"It would seem from what little chance I had of noticing the growth 

 of these young Eagles, that unless they grow much faster in a state of nature 

 than in captivity, birds of this species must remain in their nests from three 

 to four months. They are very much attached to their chosen homes, and 

 although their eggs and young may be taken from them for several successive 

 seasons, and even one of the old birds killed, the survivor will find another 

 mate and return to the old eyrie another season. 



"The cry of the male is a loud and clear 'cac-cac-cac,' quite different 

 from that of the female, so much so that I could always recognize the 

 sex of the bird by it; the call of the latter is more harsh and often broken. 

 Bald Eagles are constant residents of this vicinity, as they are of most parts of 

 Florida, unless, as the inhabitants say, they go away for awhile during the 

 summer. This I believe to be true, for there must be a scarcity of food 

 then, when the waterfowl go north, as most of them do early in the spring. 



1 believe the Bald Eagle does not breed before getting the adult plumage, 

 and that this is the case generally with birds of prey, with few exceptions." 



In the vicinity of Corpus Christi, Texas, the Bald Eagle breeds sometimes 

 on the ground. Capt. B. F. Goss writes me as follows: "Of six nests of this 

 species examined by me, near the above mentioned locality, all within 25 miles 

 of it, four were found in trees, but the two others deserve special mention, 

 as both were placed on the ground on small islands in Nueces Bay. An 

 assistant, whom I hired to help me in collecting, showed me a nest from which 

 he had taken the two young about five days previously, and had them in his 

 possession at the time. The nest was placed on a small island, not more than 



2 feet in its highest part above high water mark, and, with the exception of a 

 little grass growing in the central part, it was a bare sand reef. The nest site, 

 for it could hardly be called a nest, was located in the center of the island. It 

 consisted simply of a few sticks laid on the bare ground, not enough to make 

 a single tier even, and these were covered with bones, feathers, and fish scales, 

 and the ground in the immediate vicinity was littered with the remnants of 

 their food and the excrement of the young. We also found a small armadillo 

 on the island, which was evidently brought there by the Eagles to feed their 

 young, who probably found the shell too hard for them to crack, as it appeared 

 uninjured. The owners of this nest were said to have been in the immature 

 plumage, which accounts for the poorly constructed nest, probably being a 

 first attempt. 



