[Concord, Massachusetts]
1912
May 5
(No 2)
[May 5, 1912]

Bittern feeding on small prey

thrust her bill down into the shallow water with a quick,
decided movement, yet not much swifter than that of a hungry
Fowl picking up a kernel of corn. On each occasion she brought
up some small object which certainly was neither a fish nor
a frog and which we thought must be the larva of some water
insect, perhaps a dragon fly or a caddis worm. Shaking it once
or twice and holding it in her bill only a second or two she
swallowed it easily and with much apparent gratification as if
it were a peculiarly palatable morsel. Then she would resume
her slow measured stalk around the edge of the lagoon.
At length a male Bittern appeared on wing, alighted near her and
pumped thrice. Soon after this she appeared from behind
a mass of dead grass & other rubbish bearing in the tip of
her bill a Horn Pout about five inches in length. Just how
or where she captured it we failed, unfortunately, to observe
but we had a rare opportunity of seeing exactly how she