flight, with alternate flappings and sailings of thirty or forty yards, the
sailings more prolonged than the flappings. They alight on trees with
more ease than Herons generally do, and either stand erect or crouch on
the branches, in the manner of the Wild Turkey, the Herons seldom
using the latter attitude. When they are at rest, they place their bill
against the breast, while the neck shrinks as it were between the shoulders.
In this position you may see fifty on the same tree, or on the
ground, reposing in perfect quiet for hours at a time, although some individual
of the party will be constantly on the look-out, and readv to
sound the alarm.
In the spring months, when these birds collect in large flocks, before
they return to their breeding places, I have seen thousands together, passing
over the woods in a line more than a mile in extent, and moving with
surprising speed at the height of only a few yards above the trees. When
a breeding place has once been chosen, it is resorted to for years in succession
; nor is it easy to make them abandon it after they have deposited
their eggs, although, if much annoyed, they never return to it after that
season.
Besides the great quantity of fishes that these Ibises destroy, they also
devour frogs, young alligators, wood-rats, young rails and grakles, fiddlers
and other crabs, as well as snakes and small turtles. They never eat the
eggs of the alligator, as has been alleged, although they probably would
do so, could they demolish the matted nests of that animal, a task beyond
the power of any bird known to me. I never saw one eat any thing which
either it or some of its fellows had not killed. Nor will it eat an animal
that has been dead for some time, even although it may have been killed
by itself. When eating, the clacking of their mandibles may be heard at
the distance of several hundred yards.
When wounded, it is dangerous to approach them, for they bite severely.
They may be said to be very tenacious of life. Although
usually fat, they are very tough and oily, and therefore are not fit for
food. The Negroes, however, eat them, having, previous to cooking them,
torn off the skin, as they do with Pelicans and Cormorants. My own
attempts, I may add, were not crowned with success. Many of the Negroes
of Louisiana destroy these birds when young, for the sake of the
oil which their flesh contains, and which they use in greasing machines.
The French Creoles of that State name them " Grands Flamans,"1
while the Spaniards of East Florida know them by the name of " Gannets."
When in the latter country, at St Augustine, I was induced to
make an excursion, to visit a large pond or lake, where I was assured
there were Gannets in abundance, which I might shoot off the trees,
provided I was careful enough. On asking the appearance of the Gannets,
I was told that they were large white birds, with wings black at the end,
a long neck, and a large sharp bill. The description so far agreeing with
that of the Common Gannet or Solan Goose, I proposed no questions respecting
the legs or tail, but went off. Twenty-three miles, Reader, I
trudged through the woods, and at last came in view of the pond ; when,
lo! its borders and the trees around it were covered with Wood Ibises.
Now, as the good people who gave the information spoke according to their
knowledge, and agreeably to their custom of calling the Ibises Gannets,
had I not gone to the pond, I might have written this day that Gannets
are found in the interior of the woods in the Floridas, that they alight on
trees, &c. which, if once published, would in all probability have gone
down to future times through the medium of compilers, and all perhaps
without acknowledgment.
The Wood Ibis takes four years in attaining full maturity, although
birds of the second year are now and then found breeding. This is rare,
however, for the young birds live in flocks by themselves, until they have
attained the age of about three years. They are at first of a dingy brown,
each feather edged with paler; the head is covered to the mandibles with
short downy feathers, which gradually fall oft' as the bird advances in age.
In the third year, the head is quite bare, as well as a portion of the upper
part of the neck. In the fourth year, the bird is as you see it in the plate.
The male is much larger and heavier than the female, but there is no
difference in colour between the sexes.
TANTALUS LOCULATOR, Linn. Syst. Nat. vol. i. p. 240—Lath. Ind. Omith. vol. ii
p. 702 Ch. Bonaparte, Synops. of Birds of the United States, p. 310.
WOOD IBIS, TANTALUS LOCULATOR, Wils. Amer. Ornith. vol. viii. p. 39. pi. 68.
fig. 1. Adult Nuttall, Manual vol. ii. p. 82.
Adult Male. Plate CCXVI.
Bill long, stout, at the base as wide as the face, deeper than broad,
compressed, tapering towards the end, which is curved. Upper mandible
with the dorsal line straight to near the end, then considerably,
curved, the ridge rather broad and flattened at the base, narrowed at the