322 The "Hen Hawk" 



and having good reasons for believing that some 

 young had been reared there in the spring, this bounti- 

 ful supply of bait suggested to me an idea. I had 

 seen, but a few days before, a whole family of red- 

 tails about a woodchuck that had been shot and left 

 by its burrow. It is seldom that the old hawks feed 

 upon carrion, but many times they will come and sit 

 close by if there are convenient perches for them. 

 The young may be tempted to eat of it, for they are 

 not yet skilled in hunting and cannot catch their 

 prey so readily as can the older and more experienced 

 hawks. It is the young that sometimes come to the 

 poultry yard, for they can catch a chicken more easily 

 than they can catch a mouse. 



I inquired of the boy if he would be busy for the 

 next few days, and being answered in the negative, I 

 employed him to do a little bird watching for me. 



Near the stump where he was setting the traps 

 lay a small tree, one end of which we placed upon 

 the stump, while the other rested upon the ground. 

 Just in the rear was the swamp where the hawks 

 had been seen. The duty of the boy was to rise 

 early in the morning and, from a secluded spot, 

 watch the tree that we had placed upon the stump. 

 The first morning he saw nothing, but the second 

 he saw two of the birds perched upon the tree, with 



