54 THE SC] 
of the Wood Duck was killed, to niy 
knowledge, in this region, during the 
spring. That was brought to a local 
taxidermist on March 1. When I took my 
heavy gun from its case, in the fall, for 
the early duck shooting. I went to a 
grassy slough, near the Neosho River, 
and but one mile from town. Setting out 
about sun set, I waited until the grey of 
evening brought down the str>^ggliug 
birds, like rockets; by singles, twos 
and threes and dozens. This was about 
Sept. 20, very few Wood Ducks, and no 
Baldpates, I am positive nest in this 
region, Yet, about the date indicated, 
both these varieties were moderately 
abundant. Judging by the relative 
number of birds killed from this date 
until Oct. 20, or thereabouts, Baldpates 
were to Wood Ducks as three to one. 
Both varieties arrived at their niglit 
feeding places entirely to late in the day 
to be identified otherwise than by shoot- 
ing them. 
About the date last mentioned, Oct. 
20, the Mallards began to arrive in 
numbers, to feed on the growing wheat 
and on the ripened corn. They continu- 
ed abundant until the first ice, Nov. 
25, when they departed, en masse, but 
one specimen having been definitely re- 
ported since. The first ice brought the 
Lesser Scaups, Buflle-heads, Mergansers, 
and Ring-necks. 
Blue-winged Teal had been quite 
plenty from Aug. 20 until the middle of 
October. Red-heads and Pintails had ar- 
rived about Oct. 10, in quite large num- 
bers, and stragglers remained until the 
ice came. Of Gadwalls, I do not recall 
seeing a single bird, since they left in the 
spring. 
Some of us would dearly love to learn 
what motives or causes govern the great 
loaves of migration. But one cause is 
known to my-self; extreme change in 
temperature. 
I well remember a most remarkable 
change in the atmosphere, that took 
ENTIST. ^ 
place one autumn, several years ngo, in 
a single night. The autumn had been 
balmy; it had grown late, past mid- 
November, I believe. We retired at 
night amid soft air, and under a clear 
sky, and wakened to find the ground 
hard frozen, the sky overcast, and a few 
hard flakes of snow, scudding fitfully 
southward, in the teeth of a stern north 
wind and "by wave of their example," 
southward were speeding the Mallards, 
also, whole battallions of them, and 
armies of battallions, quarter-mile high; 
and every duck of them making a bee- 
line for the gulf. Such a sight I never 
saw before, nor shall soou. This was 
in Minnesota. To digress, for a moment, 
a year or two previous to the time just 
referred to, the log-drivers, on a small 
tributary of the St. Croix river, in Wis. 
having failed, in the spring, to float 
down all the winter's cut of pine, raised 
a head of water in November. I happen- 
ed home, at the time, and started out, 
one afternoon quite late, for the river, 
arriving in sight of the river valley, in- 
deed, too late for shooting. But I could 
scarcely believe what I saw plainly with 
my eyes, solid masses of flocks of Mal- 
lard ducks, working, low down, along 
the river, moving up-stream. I sampled 
those ducks next day, in a bayou tribu- 
tary to the river. That adventure would 
make a very pretty story. The shooting 
began before daylight and lasted until 
ten o'clock; single birds and flocks, 
flying, low down, in every direction, 
without the slightest fear, proving that 
they had not been long near the lairs of 
men . Nobody shall ever hear me tell 
how many ducks I bagged that day; 
the recollection shames me, so did the 
birds. But this adventure illustrates how 
powerfully abnormal changes in water 
conditions can, and do, affect large mass- 
es of water fowl. 
To return to the thought of wave migra- 
tion, three such waves came under my 
notice, during the past season. 
