62 



THE OOLOGIST 



have often looked into the nests of the 

 Louisiana and Little Blue Herons built 

 in the low mangroves from the steamer 

 deck as we passed near the shore. 



Often as many as three species of 

 Herons are found nesting in one group, 

 sometimes five species will be found 

 occupying a space of an acre or less 

 and generally two kinds and in the tan- 

 gle it is very difficult to secure the-par- 

 «nt bird as the Herons leave the spot 

 and give but litcle opportunity to shoot 

 them near the nest. Many nests were 

 not above twelve feet while some were 

 not over six or seven feet up. The 

 average of the lot of Heron's nests seen 

 on the trip was not above twenty feet. 

 The greatest elevation was in the case 

 of the Great Blue Heron a few of which 

 were over fifty feet up, but many of 

 them were at only ten or fifteen. 



Of course an attempt was made to 

 secure only good fresh sets, but the 

 eggs were often mixed and the waste 

 was large in the preparation. The 

 Great Blue Heron nearly always lays 

 three or four, more often three in Flor- 

 ida, as my notes show, while at the 

 north this species lays five and six and 

 occasionally seven. The Snowy, Lou- 

 isiana and Little Blue Herons varied 

 from three to five and one nest con- 

 tained seven eggs but from color and 

 shape two hens had evidently laid in 

 one nest. 



We took all sorts of trips on shore 

 away from the boat and secured many 

 of the smaller birds but few of their 

 eggs. We changed our location daily 

 and often several times a day and fish- 

 ed, fiddled and fussed to our hearts' 

 content. One of the boys had a violin 

 and one of the darkies a banjo and we 

 all sang (yelled). It was not a rare 

 thing to go bounding over the 

 lagoons or rivers, while one or two 

 would be skinning birds in the cabin or 

 blowing eggs, another trolling for 

 southern weak-fish or channel bass, 

 someone picking on the banjo and the 



whole lot grinding pretty fair musie 

 with the aid of the colored crew who 

 sang well. 



It was really essential to catch fish to 

 supply the craft and as it was we had 

 to run back for more supplies in four 

 days although we thought we had 

 enough to last a week when we started. 



Eat! Did you say'? There was never 

 anything like it, and I defy anyone to 

 cite a parallel instance. When we 

 pulled into port we made extra provis- 

 ion also for the care of specimens, as 

 the confined quarters made it rather 

 close .work to cook meals and skin 

 birds, etc., in one little cabin and there 

 was not room to house the specimens, 

 especially the skins. Then one of the 

 boys was a conchologist and collected 

 hundreds of shells. So we added a lot 

 of u y goods boxes which we placed 

 on deck. But things were just as clut- 

 tered up inside of two days as ever. It 

 was not a fashionable quarter you may 

 be sure, but we kept the oiigs scrubbing 

 and things in fair shape and as long as 

 the arsenic did not get in the pancake 

 batter it was O. K., no matter if some 

 little alligators and a lot of hermit 

 crabs wei-e crawling about the tioor 

 and we were a dirty crowd. We were 

 in perfect health and spirits and en- 

 joyed life and the outing amazingly. 



When at last, after eleven days of 

 vagabondizing we returned to partial 

 civilization we had secured over 200 

 skins and nearly 3,000 eggs. We had 

 noted 86 spectes of bix'ds and found 32 

 species nesting. I took very few of the 

 eggs as my share as they were mostly 

 unaccompanied with proper data. 



In conclusion I wish to say a word in 

 regard to this form of collecting. It is 

 to be deplored that more attention is 

 not given to careful notes and less at- 

 tention to the greedy gathering of spec- 

 imens. Many coltectors look to the 

 amassing of a collection rather than to 

 the true-blue worth of the studious and 

 thoughtful ornithologist. 



