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Fig. 3: Two days old; pushing against my hand 
the table and walked 15 inches. It constantly gave a little wheezy song 
with 70 notes a minute. That afternoon it tried to cuddle under the young 
Yellow-headed Blackbirds (Fig. 4), pushing against them and burrowing 
beneath them, but the Yellow-heads did not hover it as its parents would 
have done. 
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Fig. 4: Burrowing under Yellow-headed blackbird 
On June 28 it was very active and ate well, holding its wings straight 
out and jumping for the food. It made no attempt to pick up food itself as 
the baby Coots do their first or second days. Unfortunately, I could find 
very few insects that it liked — tiny caterpillars and grasshoppers; when 
it tasted marsh flies it shook its head and scratched its bill. The artificial 
food was not adequate; for two days it drooped, and on July 1 it died. 
A few days later a Virginia Rail, Rallus limicola, hatched in the in- 
cubator, a completely black little thing except for yellow at the base and 
tip of its bill. It was wild and would accept no food from me. The Sora 
had been “imprinted” on human beings through the circumstances of its 
birth; it considered them its parent-companions, but tried to make the 
Yellow-heads into ‘“warmth-companions.” 
5725 Harper Avenue, Chicago 37, Illinois 
