THE OUTDOOR WORL 



THESE WERE LONG, CROOKED LAKES OR BAYOUS 



bayou, an abandoned channel of the 

 river, was open for a long distance, 

 and both sides were thickly fringed 

 with shrubs and other vegetation. I 

 saw that there were wild ducks in the 

 pond and this aroused my instinct for 

 hunting. I had not a gun but some- 

 thing better. I crept along the border 

 of the new mown field close to the 

 thick fringe of willows, grasses and 

 weeds. I made my way not without 

 some noise, through the dense thicket 

 to the edge of the pond, and saw the 

 ducks quietly reposing on the mud of 

 the farther end, or swimming about on 

 the water. I snapped at them several 

 times with my camera, once when a 

 couple were flying toward me. After 



others arose, I got a picture of them 

 on the wing. 



1 next went to a field where a man 

 was cutting grain, and took several 

 pictures. I spent a few short hours 

 here and saw many interesting things, 

 but one might stay a life time study- 

 ing and photographing the plants and 

 animals and then make only a begin- 

 ning. We sometimes think we would 

 like to go to Africa and study the wild 

 beasts there but in these tangled thickets 

 of weeds, shrubs and flowers are 

 animals far less known than the large 

 beasts of Africa. The insects with 

 most interesting and varied habits are 

 little known and nobody knows any- 

 thing of the microscopic life, the beau- 



WILD DFCKS ON THE WING 



