IV 



PHOTOGRAPHING BIRDS: THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN 

 THE WORK 



The interest I had always felt in nature studies re- 

 ceived a new enthusiasm when I beheld the beauties of 

 my first bird photograph that of the Prairie Horned 

 Lark. The impression it made upon me has been so 

 lasting and the memories connected with it have been so 

 pleasant, that my zeal has not been diminished by time. 

 There is an enticing thrill in every prospective excursion 

 to a bird home or rookery. Coming in contact with wild 

 life, be it mammal or bird, is to me the very climax of 

 pioneer history-making. 



If you would not make bird pictures, study geology 

 or go fishing; cultivate the habit of going into the fields 

 and woods. Nature r s lures will sooner or later catch you 

 at some point and hold you fast. You will learn that all 

 of nature 's handiwork is of much more interest than the 

 company of some human beings. Your bird-picturing 

 trips do not end with your return home. The possessive 

 instinct is a great and dominant feature of our make-up ; 

 if you are the possessor of a good picture you are far 

 wealthier than if you owned the skin and feathers of 

 that bird. The latter are the personal property of the 

 bird, and you have no right to covet them. 



The commercial value of a good bird picture may not 

 be worth so much on the market as a mounted bird, or a 

 bird's skin; but to the future generation the value of a 

 live bird in the bush is greater than that of two dead ones 

 in the hands of a commercial ornithologist. I am not de- 

 crying the works of the museum collectors, but the 

 amateur who has the hobby of collecting bird eggs and 

 bird skins, trading and selling them, or who goes through 

 life perched on this bird-carcass hobby, deserves all of 

 the censure bestowed on him by the conservationists. 



The average bird-lover gets far more actual knowl- 

 edge from a picture true to life than from a bunch of 



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