HORNED GREBE
3. Colymbus auritus. 14 inches.
As is usual with grebes, summer brings a remarkable change in the dress of these birds. The black, puffy head is adorned with a pair of buffy white ear tufts and the foreneck is a rich chestnut color. In winter, they are plain gray and white but the secondaries are always largely white, as they are in the two preceding and the following species. The grebe diet consists almost wholly of small fish, which they are very expert at pursuing and catching under water. One that I kept in captivity in a large tank, for a few weeks, would never miss catching the shiners, upon which he was fed, at the first lightning-like dart of his slender neck. They also eat quantities of shell fish, and I doubt if they will refuse any kind of flesh, for they always have a keen appetite.
Nest.—A slovenly built pile of vegetation floating in the “sloughs” of western prairies. The 3 to 7 eggs are usually stained brownish yellow (1.70 × 1.15).
Range.—Breeds from Northern Illinois and So. Dakota northward; winters from northern U. S. to the Gulf of Mexico.
