ORNITHOLOGY 



five were found on a single tree. Koth 

 old and young birds would stand silent 

 and motionless with their bills pointed 

 upwards thereby assuming a position in 



YOUNG BLACK-CROWXKI) NIGHT HP:R0NS. 



which they most closely resembled the 

 dead branches among which they posed. 

 "A few of the young birds frightened 

 by our approach attempted to stride 

 away from the lower branches upon 

 which they had been resting, but were 

 easily captured by the more acrobatic 

 members of the i:)arty. Upon close ex- 

 amination the jjjin-feaJthered^ fledglings 

 presented a plumage of brown spotted 

 or streaked with light so that while the 

 back was decidedly brownish the under 

 parts were gray, their legs and feet were 

 pale green, wdiile the glaring yellow eyes 

 and massive mouths combined various- 

 ly to give expressions sulky, threatening 

 or stupid. Being placed upon the 

 ground they made off as fast as they 

 could but after a few attempts they ap- 

 peared to lose some of their fear, and 

 after food had been thrown into one 

 cavernous, hissing mouth there was 

 little difficulty in persuading them to 

 swallow whatever was dropped into 

 their gullets — sandwich, cake, or orange 

 peel were equally acceptable. Some of 

 these were appropriately tagged wdth the 

 aluminum bands supplied by the Ameri- 

 can Bird Banding Association, and after 

 being thus duly appreciated consented to 

 pose for their photographs. Unshapely 

 and to some forbidding they are intense- 

 ly interesting to those who wisli to make 

 comijarisons and note stages of develo])- 



'.nent. 1 hese were returned to the lower 

 branches and though as yet unable to 

 fly were, we trust, able to regain their 

 nests higher up none the worse for their 

 iniique experiences. 



'The trunks, branches and ground be- 

 neath the nests were bespattered with 

 excrementa, giving a whitewashed ap- 

 pearance, and scattered about were 

 feathers, fragments of dull light blue 

 egg shells, portions of fish and occasion- 

 al dead yoimg birds wdiich evidently had 

 fallen from the nests or branches above. 



"Desiring to know the size of the col- 

 ony a count was made which placed the 

 number of nests at approximately two 

 hundred and fifty, while the estimate of 

 more than a thousand birds, adult and 

 \oimg, seems to be conservative." 



Vivid Description of the Grackle. 



Will Webb Tuttle, of Aluncie, Indiana, 

 is doing good work in his community by 

 contributing to the local paper stories and 

 articles on nature topics. In a recent es- 

 say he speaks of the large flocks of 

 grackles. The following paragraphs are 

 an example of his vivid and poetical de- 

 scription of the birds" songs : 



"They rap on the door with their four 

 knuckles, pound the piano and hammer 

 their snare drums as if finger movement 

 and muscular expression are their main 

 achievement. Saw filing, boiler making 

 and dropping glass into barrels seem fit- 

 ting figures to describe their enthusiasm 

 as they rushed in upon us. 



"The crooning of the owl and the 

 plaintive notes of the whippoorwill pos- 

 sess the very soul of sunset ; the song of 

 the cardinal harmonizes with the glory of 

 the winding river ; the catbird flits to the 

 bush and the bobolink seems like a big 

 overgrown cricket poised in the air, the 

 reeds in its harp filled with the splashing 

 of rain and the skirt-rustling of ripe 

 grain. His wing movements resemble 

 the heat waves that rise from the parch- 

 ing meadow and the daisies mock his 

 garments that are dyed by the colors of 

 the sun." 



A recent inil)lication of the Carnegie 

 Institution of Washington is the life his- 

 tory of eight soecies of Xorth American 

 frogs and toads. The author is Mr. A. 

 H. Wright of Ithaca. New York. The 

 account is lull and the photographs are 

 man\' and excellent. 



