THE WHIP-POOR-WILL 



By T. GILBERT PEARSON 



THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF AUDUBON SOCIETIES 

 Educational Leaflet No. 73 



While walking along a country road one evening after the sun had 

 set and darkness had all but fallen, I suddenly discovered some object 

 on the ground a few yards ahead. At almost the same moment it rose, 

 and, on slow-moving wings, flew over the fence and disappeared in the 

 gloom of the woods. The flight was so silent, and the wings were so 

 broad, it was difficult to believe that it was not a great moth that had 

 just departed from view. I knew, however, that I had disturbed a 

 Whip-poor-will in the midst of its twilight dust-bath. Evidently it had 

 been trying for several minutes to find just the right spot, for there in 

 the soft earth were three slight but distinct hollows, such as only a dust- 

 ing bird would make. 



Soon afterward I heard it calling, or perhaps it was its mate, whip- 

 poor-will, whip-poor-will; the shouts came ringing through the darkness, 

 six, eight, or perhaps twenty times repeated. Then, after a pause, the 

 plaintive but stirring notes would again come up from 



The Song the old apple orchard, and fill all the space round 



about the farm-house. The still summer night seemed 

 to belong to this strange bird of the shadows, for its rhythmical cry took 

 possession of the silences, and filled the listener with contented exhilara- 

 tion. All attempts to approach it that night were futile, for its big, 

 bright eyes evidently penetrated the shadows with ease, and, long before 

 we could even make out its form, it would fly to another perch several 

 rods away. Only when it announced its presence by calling did we know 

 its position. Two or three times, however, we came near enough to hear 

 the low note, something like chuck, which immediately precedes the first 

 loud whip of its song. 



Ernest Ingersoll, in his book "Wit of the Wild," says a Whip-poor- 

 will, while singing, "will often make a beginning and then seem to stop 

 and try it over again, like a person practicing a new tune; but these 

 interruptions really mean so many leaps into the air, 

 t0 to Faf ing w ^ Perhaps frantic dodges and a somersault or two, 



for the snatching and devouring of some lusty insect 

 that objects to the process." We listened for this, but all the calls wo 

 heard were complete throughout each performance. Tt was fully two 

 hours after the sun had set before the last note of this mysterious night- 

 flyer was heard. Just before dawn it called agfain several times, and the 

 farmer's wife said she feared it was sittiner on the stone door-step. She 

 was somewhat disturbed about this, and intimated that if it were there the 



