54 
THE CONDOR 
Vol. XVIII 
scattered considerably at the time this is written (February 10, 1916) there are 
still a good many to be seen about vacant lots and parks in the heart of the 
town (figs. 21, 22). 
The accompanying photographs are offered not for their worth as speci- 
mens of the art of photography, because a long series of cloudy and dull days 
interfered sadly with the taking of scenes that needed bright lighting to get 
good effects in motion, to say nothing of many mishaps that occurred, but 
with the hope that readers of The Condor will be interested in illustrations 
of so rapidly achieved semi-domestication of wild birds in such an unexpected 
and unpremeditated manner. 
San Francisco, February 10, 1916. 
CHARACTERISTIC BIRDS OF THE DAKOTA PRAIRIES 
IV. ON THE LAKES 
By FLORENCE MERRIAM BAILEY 
F ROM THE LARGER LAKES that i visited casually during the summer 
1 brought tantalizing, confused memories of small flocks of Ducks shift- 
ing back and forth across the passes, Grebes calling across the water, 
Terns flying hither and thither, Black-crowned Night Herons posing before 
tule walls, families of Ducks trailing along the tule and cane-bordered shores, 
and numerous unnamable dots scattered over the surface, in one place one 
moment, rising and settling in another the next — tantalizing confused mem- 
ories that rise compellingly again and again and make the call of North Dakota 
well nigh too strong to resist. 
From the one short strip of open shore on Stump Lake that I was able to 
patrol for a few weeks, however, I brought a few pictures good to review. 
Foremost among them stands my first adult male Canvasback; let those to 
whom they are an old story recall the thrill of their first ! There he sat on 
the water in strong sunlight, his aristocratic bill with its straight Grecian line 
from forehead to tip showing strikingly, his red head glowing, his white can- 
vas back gleaming in the light. The strip of lakeshore, bare and uninterest- 
ing before, was distinguished by the sight. It could never be commonplace 
again. A Canvasback had been there ! The solitary aristocrat appeared in 
the same place once more, to my great delight, so brilliant in the sun that the 
sight was positively thrilling. 
Sometimes the friends that visited my shore line were just a pair of plain 
every day brownish Gadwalls, but it was none the less a pleasure to watch 
them and listen to their talk as they fed close in shore and then walked up 
on the beach together to rest, visiting with low friendly quacks. They might 
easily have been my friends of the pasture slough, Darby and Joan, as the 
lake was within easy flying distance. 
A Blue-winged Teal was caught resting at the water line one day, but 
when approached flew swiftly away. A female Golden-eye, doubtless brood- 
ing inside some goodly hollow tree bordering the lake was watched swimming 
in from a distance when she was only a large white spot fronting the angle 
of a wake until, as she fed along the beach, her bright golden eye showed 
