May., 1902. 
THR CONDOR 
63 
cerned, is the border of tules gruvvin” 
along the shallow shores. In some 
cases where the water is nowliere more 
COOTS NEST, TULE 
PHOTO BY 
LAKE, CAL. 
than five or six feet deep, as in Chewan- 
can marsh, Oregon, and Franklin Rake, 
Nevada The wliole lake is a great 
tnle marsh with here and there open 
strips of water. 
Scattered over a region of sagebrush 
desert with large ranches or open stock 
range and few human inhabitants, un- 
til a few years ago they offered a safe 
breeding ground for vast numbers of 
ducks pelicans, cormorants, grebes, 
gulls, terns, heron, stilts, avocets and 
other waders, while these in 
the lower valleys also served 
as winter resorts for the more 
northern as well as the resi- 
dent species. In spring and 
early summer the tule bord- 
ers around the lakes were 
noisy with the grating and 
squaw king of yellow-headed 
blackbirds, the rasping of 
long-billed marsh wrens, cack- 
ling and calling of co< ts and 
grebes, quacking of ducks and 
the din and racket of haish- 
voiced terns and waders 
all discordant, ui. musical 
sounds but most attractive 
and interesting to human ears and each 
telling of happ5" bird life and busj^ fam- 
ily cares. Later in tlie sea.son the tules 
are filled with the .softc r and less attract- 
ive din of millions of mosquitoes. 
Early in July of 1899, while camped 
for a few da3^s on the shore of Tule 
Lake, in northeastern Cali- 
fornia, I found many of the 
birds breeding in abundance 
and, late as it was, some of 
the species still building or 
laying. As I waded among 
the tules examining and pho- 
tographing the nests I had a 
good chance to watch the old 
birds at close range and was 
often astonished at their bold- 
ness when the nests or 5^oung 
were approached. 
As two or three downy 
RNON BAILEY. >"0 u 11 g avoccts liobbod awk- 
ward!}’ over a stubby sand- 
bar at my feet, the old birds screamed 
and dove close to my head and then 
fluttered and wallowed on the ground 
in front of me, while the black-necked 
stilts joined them in sympatlietic .scold- 
ing, In striking contrast the pelicans 
and cormorants deserted their nests and 
young at the first alarm, but with ap- 
parent reason. The pelicans had been 
entirely driven from the peninsula 
where thousands had been in the habit 
of breeding and were feeding their 
WESTERN GREBE NEST, TULE LAKE, CAL. 
young on a few little rocky islands in 
the lake, while under one group of 
trees where the cormorants nested, 
nearly a hundred almost full grown 
