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Mississippi as roosting places in large numbers, and were reported as feeding in fields in various places that I was unable to reach because of the condition of the roads.

In the bayous Mallards stood about in lines on logs floating in the water sleeping and preening. I examined numbers of these logs and found that though part of the excrement on them was composed of acorns the bulk consisted of rice hulls. In addition ducks that were shot here had in many cases been eating rice. The crop of acorns on which ducks depend for part of their fall and winter food was scanty in the wooded areas that I visited.

On November 28 I watched the evening flight of Mallards in the swamps near Jacobs' Lake. The flight began an hour before dusk and the birds were still flying over when it became too dark to see distinctly. In this time I estimated that about 10,000 Mallards had passed. All were driving toward the rice fields lying to the north.

Damage by Blackbirds.

As in 1917, blackbirds were very numerous over the rice fields and if anything were present now in greater numbers than on the previous year. Among them I identified the Bronzed Grackle, Cowbird, Rusty Blackbird and Redwing listed in order of their abundance. The Bronzed Grackle probably equalled in number all of the other species combined. Many very large flocks of them were observed and [[strikethrough]]i[[/strikethrough]] ^[[o]]n November 27 I estimated the total individuals of this species seen at 20,000.

In the rice fields the birds alighted in little groups of 6 or 8 on the shocks and began at once to hull out the rice. At other times flocks spread out along the ground to pick up scattered grain. Each