(DARK NIGHT-HERON.)
+Nycticorax obscurus+, _Scl. et Salv. Nomencl._ p. 126; _Durnford,
Ibis_, 1878, p. 03 (Buenos Ayres), et p. 399 (Patagonia);
_Gibson, Ibis_, 1880, p. 158 (Buenos Ayres). +Ardea gardeni+,
_Burm. La-Plata Reise_, ii. p. 508 (Paraná). +Nycticorax
gardeni+, _White, P. Z. S._ 1882, p. 624 (Buenos Ayres and
Salta); _Barrows, Auk_, 1884, p. 271 (Entrerios).
_Description._--Above cinereous; front white; head, nape, and
scapulars greenish black; elongated nuchal plumes white: beneath
paler, whitish on throat and middle of belly; bill black; feet
flesh-colour: whole length 26·0 inches, wing 12·0, tail 4·8, tarsus
3·2. _Female_ similar.
_Hab._ Southern half of South America.
In the Argentine Republic the Night-Heron lives in communities, and
passes the hours of daylight perched inactive on large trees or in
marshes on the rushes, and when disturbed by day they rise up with heavy
flappings and a loud _qua-qua_ cry. At sunset they quit their retreat,
to ascend a stream or seek some distant feeding-ground, and travel with
a slow flight, bird succeeding bird at long intervals, and uttering
their far-sounding, hoarse, barking night-cry.
Where the flock lives amongst the rushes, in places where there are
no trees, the birds, by breaking down the rushes across each other,
construct false nests or platforms to perch on. These platforms are
placed close together, usually where the rushes are thickest, and serve
the birds for an entire winter.
The breeding-habits of the Night-Heron have already been described in
the account of the _Ardea egretta_.
In the Falkland Islands, where Captain Abbott discovered a heronry
(_cf._ Ibis, 1861, p. 157), their breeding-habits are the same as on the
pampas.
Fam. XXXVI. CICONIIDÆ, or STORKS.
The Storks constitute a small but well-defined family of the Order
Herodiones, allied to the Ardeidæ, but distinguished by the elevated
hallux, their non-pectinated middle claw, and the absence of powder-down
patches in the plumage. They are divisible into two sub-families--the
true Storks, and the Wood-Ibises (Tantalinæ). Two of the former group
and one of the latter occur within our limits, and two of these three
species range throughout tropical America up to the Southern United
States.