CAROLINA DUCK 59 



During the first warm days of spring Carolina Ducks begin a very careful search 

 for a nesting site. Just what part the male takes in choosing from among the many 

 cavities that are explored it is difficult to say, but in confinement both sexes enter 

 freely into any kind of hollow stumps, underground burrows, or boxes which may be 

 provided. Dixon's observations on wild birds in California made him believe that 

 drakes led in the search for a suitable cavity, at least at first, but the final choice was 

 always made by the duck. He rightly suggests that the prospecting of all sorts of 

 cavities at this season of the year is a natural part of the courtship and certainly the 

 male is just as busy for a time as is the female. Many writers have mentioned the 

 preference that these ducks show for the nesting hollows of the Ivory-billed or 

 Pileated Woodpeckers, or partly rotted-out Flicker holes, but they also choose any 

 sort of natural cavity in decayed trees and even at times enter chimneys of camps 

 and deserted buildings. It is possible that numerous females have come to grief in 

 this manner, for I have heard of a number of instances, and have seen one myself. 

 Heinroth's free-flying Carolina Ducks often entered chimneys and burned them- 

 selves, so that he finally had to wire up these attractive but too dangerous aper- 

 tures ! I have never had the opportunity of seeing wild breeding females enter the 

 nest-hole, but Audubon mentions their ability to dive directly into the hole without 

 first alighting, which scarcely seems possible. Others have seen them alight on a 

 perpendicular tree near the hole. It is necessary for them to be able to accomplish 

 this feat, since they sometimes occupy old deserted woodpecker holes in large bare 

 tree-trunks. In Massachusetts they resort more commonly, I think, to partly hol- 

 lowed red maple, oak, and other trees where a large branch has at some time been 

 torn away — the sort of cavity occupied by the gray squirrel. I have been shown a 

 nest in a large oak tree standing in the middle of a corn-field at least a quarter of a 

 mile from the Ipswich River, and much greater distances from water have been 

 recorded. No doubt the nest is more commonly close to some stream or swamp, 

 often in fact directly over water, and from ten to thirty feet above the surface. At 

 times, however, it is considerably higher. Kingsford (1917) mentions a hole fifty to 

 sixty feet high in which he found Carolina Ducks nesting. 



There appear to be no recorded instances of this species having ever nested on the 

 ground, though Audubon found one nest with ten eggs in the fissure of a rock on the 

 Kentucky River. There are at least two records of nests having been found in the 

 haylofts of barns (H. R. Taylor, quoted by Grinnell, Bryant, and Storer, 1918; Sage, 

 Bishop, and Bliss, 1913). In Cuba Gundlach (1875) states that they choose hollow 

 palms or other trees, especially fallen ones, as well as crevices of rocks or similar 

 holes. Several observers have noted with astonishment the small size of the aper- 

 ture through which the female Carolina Duck can make her way, and in California 

 even the hole of the Red-shafted Flicker has been selected (Sampson, 1901). Hein- 

 roth (1911) found after considerable experiment that a hole with diameter of only 



