202 NATURE STUDY REVIEW [8 :.-)— May. 1912 



structure, habits, etc. This paper is designed especially to give 

 the student some acquaintance with reference books and other 

 sources of information. Two written tests and a final examina- 

 tion are given for the "biological" portion of the course. 



Hull Zoological Lahoratorx, The University of Chicago. 



April 15, 1912. 



The Study of Birds With the Camera 



R. W. Hegner. 



[continued from APRIL NUMBER.] 

 4. CHANGING THE NEST-SITE. 



It is rather the rule than the exception to discover nests 

 which are practically beyond the reach of the photographer, be- 

 ing built far out near the end of a branch or high up in a tree 

 that offers no adequate support for either a person's weight or 

 for a camera. The best plan is to leave such nests alone and find 

 a more favorable subject, but sometimes it is desirable to obtain 

 pictures of an inaccessible nest and it is then necessary to change 

 the nest-site. This has been done in many cases with remarkable 

 success. The branch bearing the nest is cut off carefully and 

 moved out into the open where the light is good. After fastening 

 it to a stake firmly planted in the ground, a white background 

 consisting of cheesecloth stretched across a frame may be sup- 

 plied, and photographs may then be secured as easily as if the 

 nest had been built originally near the ground — provided the 

 parent birds return to their home. Many birds desert their nests 

 and eggs upon slight provocation but will usually return to their 

 young even though the conditions of existence are greatly changed 

 (see for example the Bluebird picture in the April number of the 

 Nature Study Review). It is therefore best to wait until the 

 young are fairly well grown before making an attempt to move 

 the nest. 



The Downy Woodpecker has been selected to illustrate a 

 successful change of a nest-site. The parent birds dug their nest- 

 hole in a slender, half-dead poplar tree about twenty feet from 

 the ground. The nest could not be reached in any way. so the 

 tree was sawed off above the ground and again five feet below 

 the nest-hole. The part containing the nest was then tied to the 

 stump, thus bringing the entrance to the nest-hole about five feet 

 from the ground. 



