THE OOLOGIST 



77 



Lake," about ten miles away. I be- 

 lieve there is as much bird life here 

 as anywhere in the Province. We 

 have three wild geese, the same as 

 those father raised that you gave bim. 

 1 had four, but I think someone stolf^ 

 one of them. It was with the rest at 

 noon and about 4 o":-!ock v/as gone. 

 I keep them in the yard spring and 

 fall, as they like to wander away dur- 

 ing those seasons. In the summer 

 time I let them out and they have 

 never gone far from the buildings." 

 R. M. Barnes. 



DUCKHAWKIANA 



I specialize on Duck Hawks — oolog- 

 ically and nidiologically. In the quest 

 for this falcon's eyrie 1 find many in- 

 teresting and instructive elements. 

 Even humor, strange to say, occasion- 

 ally has its little niche. 



During the past few years I have had 

 the good fortune to locate a goodly 

 number of eyries of the Peregrine 

 Falcon, or American Duck Hawk, and 

 the good exercise of scrambling up 

 and down a greater number of moun- 

 tains and cliffs as the beautiful sets 

 of Falcon's eggs now in my cabinet 

 will bear mute witness to this fact. 

 It is a great game — and full of thrills. 



I sometimes wish I could have had 

 the opportunity to engage in this quest 

 thjrty years ago when I was young 

 enough to accomplish it with greater 

 ease. But in those days 1 couldn't 

 have had my Henryford to get about 

 in, and so, perhaps, it is just as well 

 after all. 



On one of the high mountains in 

 the State of Vermont Duck Hawks 

 have bred for many years, and occas- 

 sionally collectors have obtained their 

 eggs. In the spring of 1922 1 made 

 plans for a trip to this location to see 

 if, perchance, I might get my share 

 of the spoils of the oologist. This 

 mountain is about sixty miles from 



my home, and the trip, climb, search 

 and all make a pretty full day. Mr. 

 F. T. Pember, a well known ornitholi- 

 gical oologist, directed me to this nest- 

 ing site, and he and a young man 

 named Donald Nelson met our party 

 near the mountain early in May. We 

 first tried an uncertain prospect and 

 were unable to get any results. Then 

 we tackled the real old mountain and 

 got a fine set of eggs, with all the ac- 

 companying lips and downs, disap- 

 pointments and thrills and final suc- 

 cess. 



Upon leaving the place, I asked the 

 young man if he would care to keep 

 watch of the location and in three or 

 four weeks make a search for another 

 nest of these birds. This being agreed 

 upon 1 came home and put in my spare 

 time at other eyries. 



I usually make these trips with full 

 photographic equipment, of course, 

 and no small part of the joy of the 

 game is the getting of good pictures of 

 nests and eggs and general location. 

 The trip I have spoken of was no ex- 

 ception to this rule and, although the 

 pictures were not of the best, still, 1 

 got at least one good one, showing the 

 eggs laid on a little bed of broken 

 rock, with a long deep cave behind 

 and some foliage in front. These 

 seemed to interest the boy and I sent 

 him some prints. A few weeks later 

 I got word from him that he had 

 located the second nest and had the 

 eggs for me. This was great good 

 news and I was much pleased with 

 what the young man had accomplished. 

 The humorous part of it all comes In 

 right here. Enclosed with his letter 

 came a drawing of himself at the nest, 

 in caricature style, with the note that 

 as he didn't have the necessary cam- 

 era equipment to illustrate his work, 

 he had made use of such talents as he 

 bad at hand and presented the draw- 

 ing, which is reproduced herewith. 



