>Some Interesting (iame V)ir(ls. 



By harry C. OBERHOLSER. 



E 



NUMERATION of the different game birds in the eastern United States 

 strikingly shows how comparatively few are to be classed~as land birds. The 

 list of shore birds and water fowl, however, is a long one ; and it is a matter 



of great and general regret that among 

 them there continues such a considerable 

 diminution of numbers. Sportsmen as 

 well as naturalists are more than casually 

 interested in the species which have been 

 chosen for treatment here, and should see 

 to it that these by no mischance be doomed 

 to extinction. 



Tl)e Fjing Rail. 



If distinguished appearance and impres- 

 sive size be royal characteristics, then surely 

 the subject of this sketch is a king among 

 the rails of North America. His kingdom 

 extends throughout much of the eastern 

 United States — from the Gulf of JNIexico 

 to the Middle Atlantic States, Illinois, with 

 the northern parts of Minnesota and Wis- 

 consin ; west at least* to Kansas, Colorado 

 and Texas; while his couriers visit even 

 Ontario, Massachusetts and Maine. He 

 holds his court in the seclusion of great 

 fresh-water swamps and marshes, and in all his realm there is hardly one such of 

 any size in which, at some season of the year, he is not to be found. 



The King Rail was practically unknown to that pioneer of American ornitholo- 

 gists, Alexander Wilson, for he confused it with the common Clapper Rail ; even 



Nuttall failed to recognize its distinctness; so it was reserved for the gifted Audubon 



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SHOOTING RAIL. 



