Concord, Mass.
1910.
April 20
(No 3)
[April 20, 1910]

Bitterns.

of sexual ardour or excitement and there was nothing
suggestive of the demonstrations of courtship on the part
of either. Both behaved altogether differently from the
Bitterns seen on the 17th & 18th and, indeed, quite
after the usual manner of their kind. When they
walked it was with dignified slowness standing well
up with bodies raised lifting and putting down their
feet with marked deliberation. They crouched a few
times over a pool of water remaining there for many
minutes, evidently on the watch for prey, in an attitude
closely similar to that of the Night Heron & Great Blue
Heron when similarly engaged. Once the [female] plunged
her head suddenly under water & drew out something
which she first shook violently & then swallowed.
She spent very much of the time with her bill pointing
straight upward, her neck elongated, her body plumage