NORTH AMERICAN FAUNA 67 



in the same tidal gut. An important food of the rails here is the red- 

 jointed fiddler crab, which is found further upstream than other 

 species of fiddler crabs, but not far above the brackish zone and, as 

 far as I know, not beyond tidewater in this area. 



In some areas, fiddlers' holes or dens are concentrated mostly along 

 or just beneath the top of the embankment of a tidal gut, and at high 

 tide are inundated. Rails seem to feed mostly at low tide. When stalk- 

 ing fiddlers, rails are very slow and deliberate. When within striking 

 distance, a rail makes a quick thrust or stab at the crab. When a 

 fiddler is caught, it is often taken to some favorite feeding spot, such 

 as a muskrat house or pile of drift debris, for dismembering. The large 

 claw of the male crab is disengaged in the following manner, as 

 described by Oney (1954, p. 24-25) for the Clapper Rail: 



The bird grasps the crab with its bill between the claw and the body. Then 

 holding the crab, it vigorously shakes its head. The claw goes one way and the 

 crab another. The bird then runs over and picks up the body and swallows it. 

 The female crab does not get the same treatment because both of their claws are 

 nearly equal size. 



Some fiddlers, too large to swallow, are hacked to pieces and then 

 eaten bit by bit. 



Savannah National Wildlife Refuge 



In early April 1960, I made observations of feeding King Rails 

 along an alligatorweed-choked canal on the Savannah National Wild- 

 life Refuge. Alligatorweed forms extensive mats upon which rails, 

 gallinules, coots, herons, and several species of ducks do much of their 

 foraging for aquatic insects, fish, tadpoles, frogs, and crustaceans. 

 While this vegetation type has no apparent value in a waterfowl 

 management program, it is of obvious value to birds that utilize its 

 growth form to facilitate food gathering. Some King Rail feeding 

 territories along the alligatorweed-choked canal were no more than 

 20 feet square, indicating the high rail-food productivity of these 

 aquatic mats. 



The most frequently observed pair of rails defended their feeding 

 territory vigorously. Although they nested on the other side of the 

 dike some 40 yards distant in a sawgrass marsh, they consistently 

 returned to the same section of the canal for feeding. 



The base of operations in the pair's feeding territory was a pile of 

 debris, possibly an old alligator nest, at the edge of a small clump of 

 giant cutgrass. From here the rails radiated out to feed on the mat of 

 alligatorweed. Wlienever a crayfish or some other large morsel was 

 obtained, it was brought back to the pile of debris for "servicing" 

 and eating. Old earthen dikes still much in evidence throughout the 

 abandoned ricefield marshes of the Carolina Low Country are also 

 used for this purpose. 



