PeewACO DU BO Ne BU ETN 39 
of which contained eight eggs, while in the other two were seven eggs each. 
These nests were floating masses of vegetation, and the eggs were concealed 
beneath decaying marsh growths. I photographed the grebes during the 
next three weeks, and in that time I never saw an adult bird—except from 
my photographic blind. ‘The old ones were so shy, they always slipped from 
their nests before I was near enough to see them. 
In the rushes, near the open water, were several nests of Red-winged 
Blackbirds, and in half an hour’s search I found six nests of the American 
Coot, with sets of eggs ranging from two to eight in number. An American 
Bittern was observed, standing motionless among the reeds, and I found 
it was upon its nesting platform and that there was one egg. 
The rails started building their nests later in May, and several un- 
finished ones were observed May 16, but I was unable to determine the 
species, as there were no eggs. A few days later I found a nest of the Virginia 
Rail with two eggs (which was found abandoned on the next visit), and 
on May 29 I found another of the same species with nine eggs. “Thirty 
feet away in a similar location, in the tules a few inches above the water, 
was a nest of the Sora Rail, which had been destroyed, the eggs having 
been kicked into the water. Muskrats are abundant in this marsh, and it 
is probable that one of these animals used the nest as a resting platform. 
This same date I found a nest of the King Rail with six eggs, a bulky 
platform in a dense stand of marsh vegetation. 
The Least Bittern and the Long-billed Marsh Wren seem to nest later 
than their neighbors, for I located two nests of the former and six of the 
wrens during the middle of July. 
These roadside marshes then, inconspicuous areas of low lands, are of 
great importance in that they furnish breeding places for many forms of 
bird life, and efforts to drain the swampy places should be discouraged. 
During the season in this little pond which I learned to call “my 
marsh,” as I visited it so many times, I observed no fewer than nine nests 
of the Pied-billed Grebe, six of the American Coot, two of the Virginia 
Rail, one of the Sora Rail, two of the King Rail, two of the Least Bit- 
tern, one of the American Bittern, twenty-five of the Red-winged Black- 
bird, and eight of the Long-billed Marsh Wren. 
Times change. Two years have passed, and “my marsh’”’ is no more. 
Civilization is ahead, and hurrying automobiles have gained fifteen seconds 
of time by the straightening of Roosevelt Road. A concrete highway now 
bisects the low area which was once the nesting grounds of more than one 
hundred pairs of marsh birds; the marsh has been drained except for com- 
paratively small places, and “my” birds have had to move elsewhere. 
