. Our birds in their haunts [microform] : a popular treatise on the birds of eastern North America. Birds; Oiseaux. THE DABCHICK. 176 marked with red about the head. In most species the color of the plumage changes greatly with the season, and there is a conspicuous ruff or ornament about the head of the male in the breeding period. The plumage of the under parts has a peculiar open structure and a satiny, lustrous surface, inducing its use as fur. The nesting habits of the family are similar throughout. The Dabchick is some long. The bill, which is shorter and thicker than that of most
. Our birds in their haunts [microform] : a popular treatise on the birds of eastern North America. Birds; Oiseaux. THE DABCHICK. 176 marked with red about the head. In most species the color of the plumage changes greatly with the season, and there is a conspicuous ruff or ornament about the head of the male in the breeding period. The plumage of the under parts has a peculiar open structure and a satiny, lustrous surface, inducing its use as fur. The nesting habits of the family are similar throughout. The Dabchick is some long. The bill, which is shorter and thicker than that of most Grebes, is pale blue, with a black ring around the part perforated by the nostril. The upper parts are dark brown, the fore-neck reddish, belly white, sides grayish; under the chin there is a black spot in spring, the only distinguishing mark of the breeding season. In the fall this last mark is wanting, and the young have the throat white, streaked with dark. Late in the fall even the young are much smaller than the parents. Having had my attention called to the breeding of this species at St. Clair Flats by the communications in the Oologist—now Ornithologist and Ooiogist — by Mr. W. H. Collins, a distinguished taxidermist of Detroit, I gave the matter a ca?-etul investigation when visiting that place in the spring of 1882. The nest, built up from the bottom in watie; f om a foot to eighteen inches deep, to several inches above the water, is a sort of pier, sheltered by sedges, cat-tails and rushes; and though stationary as thus pro- tected, is so nearly afloat that any considerable agitation of the water will rook it to and fro. It is a carefully laid pile of soaked and decaying rushes of former years, and other decaying matter from the bottom, with a good deal of the larger fresh water algae mixed in. Cylindrical, some 18 inches in diameter, and symmetrically rounded at the top, and having a slight depression for the eggs, it is the wettest, dirtiest, nastiest thing to
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectbirds, bookyear1884
