The American Coot 



from the water, floundering and kicking to get up steam; then lumbering 

 off at a low height only to splash down again at what it supposes a safe 

 distance. Under the spell of persecution the birds learn to get up more 

 nimbly, and once under way, prove to be not ungraceful flyers. In flight 

 they carry their legs at full length behind them, and seem to use them quite 

 cleverly as a rudder, to supply the deficiencies of the abbreviated tail. 

 Whether flying or diving or walking, the mud-hen enjoys a highly 

 varied diet. While much of its food consists of snails and water bugs and 

 aquatic larvae, it feeds heavily upon water plants and herbage. Upon a 

 northern lake I watched a flock of mud-hens feeding upon a long-leafed 

 water plant which grew two or three rods from shore and in some depth 

 of water, say six or eight feet, and which could be obtained only by diving. 

 In diving, the Coots leaped upward and turned a half somersault in the air, 

 quite after the fashion of the grebe, and they brought the leaves to the 

 surface in dripping beakfuls to be devoured piecemeal. The birds are 



Taken in San Francisco 



THE CROWD 



Photo by the Author 



quite capable, likewise, of gleaning grain from the bottom of a duck-pond, 

 and on this account have gotten themselves cordially disliked by the 

 sportsmen. 



While chiefly a fresh-water bird, the Coot infests brackish ponds as 

 well and has no aversion to the salt, salt sea, if only an easy living is 



1561 



