SSPECIMENS of this bird when seen for the first time always excite wonder and admiration. The beautiful plumage, the strange figure, and the curiously shaped bill at once attract attention. Formerly this Spoonbill was found as far west as Illinois and specimens were occasionally met with about ponds in the Mississippi Bottoms, below St. Louis. Its habitat is the whole of tropical and subtropical America, north regularly to the Gulf coast of the United States.

Audubon observed that the Roseate Spoonbill is to be met with along the marshy or muddy borders of estuaries, the mouths of rivers, on sea islands, or keys partially overgrown with bushes, and still more abundantly along the shores of the salt-water bayous, so common within a mile or two of the shore. There it can reside and breed, with almost complete security, in the midst of an abundance of food. It is said to be gregarious at all seasons, and that seldom less than half a dozen may be seen together, unless they have been dispersed by a tempest. At the approach of the breeding season these small flocks come together, forming immense collections, and resort to their former nesting places, to which they almost invariably return. The birds moult late in May, and during this time the young of the previous year conceal themselves among the mangroves, there spending the day, returning at night to their feeding grounds, but keeping apart from the old birds, which last have passed through their spring moult early in March. The Spoonbill is said occasionally to rise suddenly on the wing, and ascend gradually in a spiral manner, to a great height. It flies with its neck stretched forward to its full length, its legs and feet extended behind. It moves with easy flappings, until just as it is about to alight, when it sails over the spot with expanded wing and comes gradually to the ground.

Usually the Spoonbill is found in the company of Herons, whose vigilance apprises it of any danger. Like those birds, it is nocturnal, its principal feeding time being from near sunset until daylight. In procuring its food it wades into the water, immerses its immense bill in the soft mud, with the head, and even the whole neck, beneath the surface, moving its partially opened mouth to and fro, munching the small fry—insects or shell-fish—before it swallows them. Where many are together, one usually acts as a sentinel. The Spoonbill can alight on a tree and walk on the large branches with much facility.

The nests of these birds are platforms of sticks, built close to the trunks of trees, from eight to eighteen feet from the ground. Three or four eggs are usually laid. The young, when able to fly, are grayish white. In their second year they are unadorned with the curling feathers on the breast, but in the third spring they are perfect.

Formerly very abandant, these attractive creatures have greatly diminished by the constant persecution of the plume hunters.