July, 1906 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



35 



have a bill adapted for the rapid gobbling up ol the small 

 fish of the schools with which he may come in contact, as well 

 as a basket in which they may be deposited until a time of 

 leisure for devouring them presents itself. Strength is not 

 an essential, hence we find the bill of the pelican attaining 

 a length of ten or more inches, the upper mandible only of 

 sufficient strength to meet the requirements, the lower 

 mandible a light, pliable framework, divided nearly to the 

 tip, and supporting a capacious pouch. 



The man-o'-war bird, besides being sometimes an honest 

 fisherman, is often a robber of other fishermen, worrying 

 other birds who have made a catch until the prey is dropped, 

 to be seized by the marine highwayman. While the bill is 

 of the same general pattern as that of the pelican, it is mod- 

 ified to meet the difference in habit, lightened and made less 

 cumbersome by being much shortened (4^ inches), and 

 decidedly firmer, with a greatly reduced pouch. 



every one from the bill of the domestic bird. It varies in 

 degree to a considerable extent in the different forms, but 

 the general shape remains. The spoonbill has a very well 

 shaped ladle for scooping up his food. 



The bill of the woodcock is a striking example of per- 

 fect adaptation to special requirements. Long, slender, anil 

 tubular in shape, the upper mandible projects beyond the 

 lower, and the tip is flexible, and exceedingly sensitive. I he 

 bird feeds by probing in soft, damp earth for worms and the 

 like, the flexible mandible tip acting as a sensitive finger to 

 locate and extract the prey. The snipe, with a bill almost 

 exactly similar, has about the same habits in feeding. I he 

 sandpipers, with food habits more intermediary between the 

 woodcock's and those of birds possessing the type form, 

 have bills more approaching in shape those of the latter, and 

 the plovers still more typically shaped beaks. 



There are examples of very remarkable bills, whose 



Grooved Bill Ani 



Horned Owl 



Iangrove Cuckoo 



The puffins, another family of seabirds, include Crustacea 

 with fish in their bill of fare, and find a most radically differ- 

 ent form of bill best adapted to their needs. The gulls and 

 terns, birds of the seas and great lakes, are more omnivorous 

 in their food habits, being water scavengers, and their bills 

 approach much more nearly the type selected. Seabirds 

 either build no nest at all, laying their eggs on bare rock or 

 sand, or construct a loose, shabby affair, of seaweed, so that 

 they are unhampered in this task by the lack of a more 

 delicate organ. 



The flamingo, feeding in more or less shallow lagoons, 

 on certain Crustacea, is compelled, by his height, to take his 

 food with bill inverted — that is the lower mandible is above 

 while feeding, as the bird's neck is bent down. Often scrap- 

 ing the food from the bottom of the pools, an exceedingly 

 peculiar shape of bill is the result of the bird's special needs. 



The typical shape of bill in the duck family is familiar to 



strange shapes are not explained by requirements of food- 

 getting or nest-building. These are most conspicuous among 

 certain foreign species. The rhinoceros hornbill of Africa 

 is an example of one of these very peculiar forms of bill. 

 In such cases it is supposed that the decorations of the bill 

 serve as sexual attractions. 



The gallinaceous birds, to which our domestic fowl be- 

 longs, are more or less omnivorous in feeding, and the bill 

 forms are not widely divergent from the type. 



The hawks and owls require bills that will hold and tear 

 prey, and they have prolonged and strongly curved upper 

 mandibles and bills of great strength. The shrike, belonging 

 to a very different order, yet with food habits much the 

 same, has a similar shape of bill. The kingfisher, securing 

 his prey with a scissors-like motion of the bill, after a dive, 

 has a large and powerful beak, well suited to cut the water 

 as he plunges. A small relative, found only in the West 



