THE OSPREY. SI 
dipped their heads in and splashed their wings vigorously ; 
then they stood and preened their feathers for some 
minutes. One bird walked about in the most absurdly 
clumsy manner, apparently in order to find water of proper 
depth.” 
The flashlight photograph which I attempted at Atlantic 
Highlands proved not to be a success. The reason, as | 
feared at the time, was that the sleeping bird on the nest 
was invisible in the photograph, by reason of the angle 
between the camera on the ground and the nest in the 
tree-top. Another flashlight experiment, which I made 
on Gardiner’s Island, was similarly disappointing, because 
the tall branch upon which the bird decided to perch 
proved to be beyond the edge of the picture. In both 
cases, however, the practical disregard by the Osprey of 
the magnesium discharge (though necessarily a heavy one) 
was quite surprising. Perhaps they mistook it for a flash of 
lightning! At Atlantic Highlands as related, the bird did 
not even leave her nest ; and at Gardiner’s Island, of some 
half-dozen Ospreys perching within a couple of hundred 
feet, only my particular bird took wing, and she merely 
circled about and alighted again almost at once. [ am 
convinced that Ospreys can see with considerable distinct- 
ness in the dark. I have even observed them flying with 
fish in the dusk, long after it would be supposed they could 
see to hunt. Whatever time of night one passes their 
haunts, one will be greeted with the usual whistles and 
complaints, and catch sight of the dim forms of the birds 
passing to and fro, apparently flying and alighting at will. 
When the Osprey chicks are still very young, their mother 
broods them at night much as she might incubate eggs— 
sitting close and with wings drawn down. When they 
are well grown she merely roosts upon the edge of the nest, 
or upon a branch close by. We observed that in the beach 
nests the young birds, which during the heat of the day find 
the greatest coolness about the margin of the nest, prefer, 
for the opposite reason, to huddle at night in a warm 
