396 
ALECTORIDES. 
The Coot can swim and dive with great ease ; but when starting to fly seems to 
have great difficulty in rising, at first flapping the water and almost walking upon it 
for some distance. When once fairly up it can move with considerable swiftness, 
resembling in this a Grebe much more than a Kail. In the spring it becomes quite 
noisy, the flocks making a kind of chattering chorus, but becoming silent again after 
they have separated in pairs for the breeding-season. A few breed as far south as 
Santa Barbara, where Dr. Cooper saw young on the 10th of May, while at Puget Sound 
they appear early in June. Dr. Cooper did not meet with the nest of this species, 
but he was informed by Dr. Lieb that it is composed of dry rushes, without lining, 
loosely constructed, and several inches thick at the bottom. It is five inches deep 
and nearly two feet wide, and sometimes floats among the rushes. The eggs are said 
to be from ten to fifteen in number, greenish yellow in ground-color, sprinkled with 
small brown specks, and measure 2.00 by 1.25 inches. 
This bird resembles the Rail in having a compressed body, and can make its way 
through the dense reeds where Ducks cannot pass, and where the water is too deep 
for Kails. In such situations it spends most of its time, feeding on grass-seeds, 
leaves of aquatic plants, small shells, and insects, collecting much of its food under 
the water. On the land it can sometimes be caught by hand before it is able to rise. 
Examples were obtained by Mr. Skinner in Central America, and others were 
observed in abundance on the -Lake of Duenas by Mr. Salvin, which, from speci- 
mens afterward obtained, were ascertained with certainty to be of this species. It 
is given by Leotaud as rare in Trinidad. 
Mr. March describes the eggs of this species, found by him in Jamaica, as being 
eight or more in number, oval, pointed at one end, grayish stone-color, splashed all 
over with small bistre-brown spots and dots. The ground-color is at first very pale, 
but becomes darker by exposure. 
Mr. Gosse states that it may be seen at all hours of the day in the immense morass 
of Savanna la Mar, there being hundreds congregated within an acre. There they are 
wary to an excess, the distant sight of a man or the snapping of a dry twig alarming 
the whole flock, though the noise of cattle walking on the shore has no such effect. 
A few specimens of this bird are recorded by Major Wedderburn and Mr. Hurdis 
as having been obtained at Bermuda, usually in November and December, and in one 
instance on the 28th of May. 
Mr. Say observed it in the lower part of Missouri Territory ; and in Long’s 
Expedition it was seen in Lake Winnipique on the 7th of June. Mr. Swainson 
also obtained specimens on the Plateau of Mexico. Mr. Nuttall mentions that about 
the 15th of April, 1833, a pair took up their residence in Fresh Pond, Mass., and 
in the following June were occasionally seen, accompanied by their young. It is 
probable that similar occurrences are more common than is generally supposed. Bar- 
tram informed Wilson that this bird is resident and abundant in Florida. Audubon, 
however, controverts this statement, believing that the Coot is found in either Louis- 
iana or Florida from November to the middle of April only, that none remain there 
after that period, and that none breed there. So sweeping a conclusion from merely 
negative evidence is somewhat rash, in view of the fact that the Coot is known to 
breed in large numbers in the Island of Cuba on the one hand, and in Texas, and 
Tamaulipas, Mexico, on the other. In one instance, at least, it has been found breed- 
ing at Monticell o, West Florida, from which place its egg was sent me by Mr. Samuel 
Pasco, a citizen of that place. 
Mr. Audubon mentions having once encountered a large flock of these birds, several 
hundreds in number, on the Mississippi on the 22d of March. They were feeding on 
