210 HOW TO STUDY BIRDS 



so, or as they fly up. In a colony one needs many 

 plates. I find that I can use as many as sixty in a 

 day, under favorable conditions, and all carefully ex- 

 posed. The time is golden, and one must not keep 

 the birds off their nests in any one place very long, 

 for, if the sun is hot, it will result in the destruction 

 of all the eggs and young. 



Pictures of birds in flight are always of great in- 

 terest, and one should study every possible means 

 of securing these. Swallows flying to their nests 

 make possible subjects, also chimney swifts entering 

 or leaving a chimney, ospreys near their nests, ducks 

 or herons flushed in a marsh or from the shore, gulls 

 hovering about docks, terns over schools of fish, 

 shore-birds flying along the beach, wild-fowl flying 

 over promontories, and so on. The more one studies 

 to find opportunities, the more will various ways and 

 means be thought out. The artistic possibilities of 

 this sort of work are very great. One or more fly- 

 ing birds in an attractive combination of landscape, 

 shore, or wave may make a wonderfully effective pic- 

 ture. 



Even when there are no birds to be photographed, 

 the reflecting camera is a very useful instrument to 

 have. Merely by looking at various scenes through 

 the large view-finder as one walks out, many artistic 

 possibilities may be noticed, which otherwise would 

 pass unrecognized. It is the instrument, above all 

 others, with which to take pictures of children, do- 

 mestic animals, people in action, sporting or athletic 



