THE YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOO 



I stated in the introduction that in instances where the young 

 were similar to their elders and I had secured studies of them 

 w 7 hen half grown, they would be used in preference to the grown 

 birds, because as a rule ten people out of every dozen who care 

 for birds prefer these unusual pictures of the young. Cuckoos 

 are in this list, but they should be taken out. Here I do not use 

 the pictures of the young for that reason. I should be most 

 proud to publish a reproduction of the grown Cuckoo, as I never 

 have seen one and should regard the picture an achievement. I 

 have tried and tried, many times, but so far I always have 

 failed. The habits of the bird make failure in his case almost 

 certain. 



In the first place, their location makes a snap shot impossible, 

 while in the second their nature makes a time exposure equally so. 

 They always choose a secluded location where experience teaches 

 them that probably they will be solitary. They select the 

 thickest place they can find, where leaves grow in masses, for 

 their nest. They are not so unfriendly. One can approach 

 very close, but in the dense shade and surrounded by leaves as 

 they are, a picture is not possible unless time could be given, 

 which is not feasible, for the instant one pauses, the bird is gone 

 with exactly the same motion with which a big black watersnake 

 glides from bush to bush in dense underbrush. 



Jacob Studer says the Cuckoo is a "slipper;" the term fits 

 him perfectly. He is indeed a slipper. The word seems coined 

 to describe this subject. The Brown Thrush can not equal him 

 in the graceful art of vanishing in deep shrubbery. So I never 

 have secured his likeness. 



The Cuckoo always is associated in my mind with deep, 

 thickly leaved, cool places, where moss and wild flowers cover the 

 damp earth, where silence reigns and solitude is unbroken. It is 

 from such places that the weather prophet booms his never-failing 



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