Birds of Farm Slough

							A marsh can be profitable even
though it yields no money.



                     Birds of a Farm Slough
                        From Marsh Wrens to Snowy Owls
                                 Bennie Bengtson

        Along one side of our farm           wade the muddy shores. On a mild

 4      near Kennedy in the northwest-
        ern tip of Minnesota is a stretch
                                             warmish day in late spring, with the
                                             sky overcast and rain clouds shedding
of low, marshy land. In the center of        fine mist, there comes from the direc-
this area—it drains inward as into a         tion of the slough a wild caroling,
basin—is a fairly large slough, gen-         rising and falling in the damp air,
erally referred to by the neighborhood       now loud and clear, now almost in-
as the "big slough", which has never,        audible—"keep-a-going, keep-a-going,
to my memory, gone entirely dry even         keep-a-going"—the flight song of the
in seasons of prolonged drouth. This         lesser yellow-legs. Often of a calm
is because part of the slough consists       summer evening we sit on the porch
of a peat bog fed by underground             of the farmhouse, watching the twi-
springs, and apparently unaffected by        light falling, and listening to the
surface moisture.                            chorus of the frogs in the marsh, a
   As far as agriculture is concerned,       concert including in its repertoire the
this land is worthless, but it has been      weird hollow booming of a bittern
fenced into the cow pasture. Though          and the bell-like tinkling notes of the
it yields no income that can be figured      mudhens or American coots.
directly in dollars and cents, it is one        During seasons of average rainfall,
of the most profitable parts of the farm     the slough is well-filled with water all
in another sense, and as valuable as         summer, and the tall reeds and rushes
the fertile, tillable land. For it affords   that cover its surface, with the excep-
a refuge to many marsh-loving birds,         tion of one open area, make an excel-
birds we would not otherwise have            lent covert for the nests of marsh-
so near that we could see and enjoy          loving birds. Last summer, as on a
them.                                        number of previous occasions, I took
   In spring and fall ducks by the           time off from the farm work for an
scores stop to rest and feed among its       excursion through the marsh, taking a
rushes and tall marsh grass. Migrating       census of its feathered inhabitants,
shore birds, phalaropes, Wilson's snipe,     and investigating their nesting ac-
sandpipers, and many others, love to         tivities.

20
                        BIRDS OF A FARM SLOUGH                                   21

    It was a warm day late in June.        unlined by any finer grass or feathers.
 As I walked near the pasture fence,       In it were nine eggs, heavily peppered
 the meadowlarks perching on the           with minute black specks on a light
 posts caroled joyously, with now and      grayish-tan background.
 then a vesper sparrow adding his re-
                                              Swinging around this nect in widen-
frain. Wearing an old pair of overalls
                                           ing circles, I located two more coot
tucked into a worn-out pair of boots       nests and one belonging to the peid-
to protect my feet and legs from the       billed grebe. The grebe nest was con-
 sharp-edged marsh grass, I stepped        structed from dried marsh grass of
into the water. Most of the time not       the previous season and floated on the
much more than knee deep and never        water. When I first noticed it at a little
more than waist deep, it was not cold.     distance it appeared to be empty, just
In one hand I carried a pole with          a heap of old grass on top of the
which to steady myself as I slowly        water. A handful of loose grass cov-
traversed the soft and uneven bottom.     ered the three white eggs, now much
Here and there grass covered hum-          stained, keeping them hidden from
mocks rose above the level of the         the sharp eyes of marauding crows
water, and these I examined, looking      that come to the slough to drink. Here,
for nests and marsh flowers.              too, the parent birds put on quite a
   I had waded but a short distance       show to draw me away from their
 out when a pair of blue-winged teal      homesite, splashing in the water, cry-
took wing from a little opening in the    ing and wailing as if they were injur-
tall grass. Beating back and forth in     ed, one of their vocal effects resem-
the vicinity, I flushed another pair of   bling the sound made by the whistling
these pretty litde ducks but found no     balloons so popular among youngsters.
sign of any nests. Leaving this area         As I waded about red-winged
I headed out into deeper water, but       blackbirds entertained me with re-
had gone only three or four rods when     peated renditions of their "con-quer-
a wild hubbub broke out in the rushes     eee" song, and from atop the tallest
ahead. Some fairly large water bird       reeds the male yellow-heads, larger
splashed about furiously, darting here    cousins of the red-wings, delivered
and there, unseen to my eyes but its      with much effort and puffing out of
whereabouts were indicated by the         the throat and breast, a strident tinny
movement of the rushes. Looking           croak which, I have no doubt, they
down I discovered not far away, the       proudly regarded as a song.
nest of a mudhen. Erected on a plat-        Striking out in the direction of the
form of bent down rushes, it was          bog—on whose quaking surface of
built of more green rushes and was        sphagnum moss one can walk without
22                  THE CONSERVATION VOLUNTEER

danger of sinking deeply—I came upon      low-head is a handsome fellow. Ap-
the nests of two pairs of red-wings,      parently not unaware of his good
cradles woven of coarse marsh grass       looks, his swaggering walk as he
and suspended above the water in          strolled about the banks of the slough
tall reeds. One nest contained three      was almost ludicrous. The female, as
fledglings, just hatched, and the other   is true with the red-wing, is not so
four eggs. The entrance was on the        gaily attired, being a rather streaky
side, the top being covered over. The     brown, with a little yellow on the
eggs, of a dull bluish-white ground       throat and about the eyes. As I
color, were scrawled about the big        wandered about, marsh wrens darted
end with dark purplish-black streaks.     nervously through the sedges, singing
The nest with the eggs was anchored       intermittendy while perched in the
to a large dead weedstalk on one side     swaying tops of tall reeds. I found
and on the other to green reeds. Al-      three incompleted and unused nests-
ready it was beginning to lean, as the    grass balls woven from the tops of
reeds were growing and the weed, of       tall rushes and thus suspended above
course, was not.                          the water—before I found one in
   Off to one side of the slough, in a    which there were eggs. These "dum-
litde area by themselves, I found the     my" nests are never finished and put
homesite of the yellow-headed black-      into use. Whether they are decoys to
birds. Within a few yards of each other   lure marauders away from the real
I located three nests, very similar in    home, or merely an outlet for the ex-
appearance to those of die red-wing       cess energy of this little busybody,
and hung in the same way, a foot-and-     would be hard to say. The eggs were
a-half or so above the water. Lined       a pale brown lightly scrawled with
with duck feathers, one contained four    darker colorations. So tiny an opening
eggs, one three, and the other two.       had been provided as a doorway that
The eggs had a grayish-white back-        I could barely insert a finger into it.
ground rather thickly sprinkled with
                                             As I waded ashore, a pair of mal-
light brown spots and splotches. They
                                          lards slid by, slowing down, and I
greatly resembled the eggs of English
                                          watched them land on the far side of
sparrows, only were larger.
                                          the slough. It is probable the nest
  Lacking but an inch or so of being      was not far away. Two or three pairs
a foot long, wearing a bright yellow      of mallards usually build in our
cap and neckpiece draped well down        slough, sometimes more, and not in-
over his shirtfront, but otherwise        frequently gadwalls, also. One season
dressed in black except for a pair of     I found half a dozen nests of this
white wing chevrons, the male yel-        rather large, brown-mottled duck.
                           BIRDS OF A FARM SLOUGH                                              23

   In the spring and early summer                where all sorts of charming and di-
the slough is often visited by herring,          verting visitors come. Even during the
ring-billed, and Franklin's gulls, and           winter months when locked with
by the little black terns whose crook-           snow, it is not deserted, for jack rab-
ed, darting flight back and forth over           bits gambol on its white expanse,
                                                 keeping a wary eye out for prowling
the water in chase of insects makes me
                                                 minks and weasels. And over it, on
think of them as oversize chimney
                                                 silent wing, glides that tiger of the
swifts. Now and then a great blue
                                                 air, the snowy owl. A bold wanderer
heron drops in for a leisurely call and          from the far North, it scans the
gets referred to as a "blue crane" but           marsh's white mande for a stray rab-
does not seem to mind particularly.              bit on which to breakfast of a frosty
Our marshland is a fascinating place             January morning.



                              KEEP M I N N E S O T A G R E E N


                                                                                      i

                              WITH      OUR      AUTHORS


     ARNOLD B. ERICKSON—Parasitologist, Bureau of G a m e , Division of G a m e and
         Fish.
     THOMAS A . SCHRADER—Pittman-Robertson            Projects Leader, Division of   Game
         and Fish.
     BARRY ROWLES—Winner of Fire Prevention Essay Contest, Coleraine.
     H . A . LEVER—Assistant Chief Engineer, Division o f Lands and Minerals.
     TOM KELLY—Lecturer and Artist, Department of Conservation.
     R. B. HARVEY—Professor of Plant Physiology, University of Minnesota.
     BENNIE BENGTSON—Free-lance writer, Kennedy, Minnesota.
      LLOYD L. SMITH, JR.—Fisheries Research Supervisor, Division of G a m e and Fish.
     SAMUEL EDDY—Associate Professor o f Z o o l o g y , University of Minnesota.
     KEN MORRISON—Associate Editor of Publications, Department of             Conservation.
     HAROLD SEARLS—Acting H e a d , Bureau of Information, Department of Conser-
          vation.

     T . SURBER—Technical Advisor, Division o f G a m e and Fish.
     LYTTON TAYLOR—Outdoor Editor, St. Paul Dispatch and Pioneer Press.
     ALFRED L. NELSON—Informational Representative, Department of             Conservation.
     THOMAS R. EVANS—Stream Improvement Supervisor, Division of G a m e and Fish.
     GUSTAV    SWANSON—Associate     Professor   of    Economic   Zoology,   University   of
          Minnesota.