Hab. Paraguay, Uruguay, Argentina, and Bolivia.
This is perhaps the most abundant species of Fulica in the Plata region, and certainly congregates in the largest numbers. The colour of the beak and shield is of a very delicate yellow; the legs and feet dull green; the head, neck, and part of the back velvet-black; all the rest of the plumage dark slate-colour, except the under coverts of the tail, which are white, and render the bird very conspicuous when it is swimming away with the tail raised vertically.
On the pampas, in large marshy lagoons, this Coot is sometimes seen in immense numbers; thousands of birds uniting in one flock, and spreading over the low shores to feed, they look like a great concourse of Rooks. But they are exceedingly timid, and at the sight of a bird of prey or other enemy they all scuttle back to the water, tumbling over each other in their haste to reach it. They rise in a peculiar manner, rapidly striking the surface of the water with their great lobed feet, often for a distance of twenty or thirty yards before they are fully launched in the air. They are loquacious birds, and when swimming about concealed among the thick rushes are heard answering each other in a variety of curious tones, some of their loud, hollow-sounding, reiterated cries resembling peals of laughter.
The nest is a slovenly structure of rushes lying on the water, with a very slight depression for the eggs, which are ten or twelve in number. These are long, pointed at one end, dull cream-colour, marked over the whole surface with small blackish and purple spots.
[ Fam. XLIV. ARAMIDÆ, or COURLANS.]
The Courlans are a peculiar American family, intermediate between the Cranes and the Rails. Of the two known species, which are nearly allied, one occurs in the Argentine Republic.
[382.] ARAMUS SCOLOPACEUS (Gm.).
(SOUTHERN COURLAN.)
Aramus scolopaceus, Burm. La-Plata Reise, ii. p. 504 (Paraná); Scl. et Salv. Nomencl. p. 141; iid. P. Z. S. 1869, p. 160; Hudson, P. Z. S. 1876, p. 102 (Buenos Ayres); Durnford, Ibis, 1877, p. 196 (Buenos Ayres); Gibson, Ibis, 1880, p. 160 (Buenos Ayres); Barrows, Auk, 1884, p. 277 (Entrerios).
Description.—Above brown; forehead, lores, and chin greyish white; neck striped with white: beneath similar; bill brown; legs greenish grey: whole length 24·0 inches, wing 13·0, tail 5·0. Female similar.