HUNTING BIRDS WITH CAMERA 



about half their size, were all in the nest, just dried off 

 ready to leave, as they always do very shortly after 

 hatching. The mother was brooding them, and she 

 fluttered off, while the young scrambled out of the nest 

 in an instant and hid in the grass. Between us both we 

 managed to find ten, which we put back in the nest, 

 where I photographed them and the egg shells. Each 

 one of the eggs had the larger end neatly split off to let 

 out the chick. The membrane held the piece like a 

 lid, and in most cases it had shut down again so neatly 

 that one would hardly notice but that the eggs were 

 round and full as ever of young quail. As soon as I 

 went away the anxious mother, who had been whining 

 at us from the wall, sneaked back to her chicks and 

 doubtless led them away at once. It was disappointing 

 that it was a dark showery day, so that I could not try 

 for a snapshot at the family as they left their happy 

 home for the wide, wide world. 



"My, but wasn't it great luck!" About a week later 

 another farmer mowed by a nest and found it. This 

 one was not half a mile from the other, right beside a 

 much-traveled road, under the end of a pile of fence 

 rails. This bird was very different in disposition from 

 the other. She was so tame that Ned and I could 

 stroke her on the back without making her leave her 

 eggs, so accustomed had she become to seeing people, 

 who were constantly passing so near that they surely 

 would have stepped on her, had it not been for the 

 protecting rails. She was in plain sight now, without 



25 



