THE OOLOGIST. 



207 



this situation for a Hawk's nest. My 

 friend had heard the clanking notes 

 near by and had reasoned that the nest 

 must be in the patch. Three eggs were 

 in this set, which, though not a com- 

 plement, were taken . 



A mile further on a nest was visited 

 t which was built in a tall spindling 

 beech. It exactly resembled one of 

 those squirrel's nests we so often see in 

 the woods, and wculd not have tempt- 

 ed any one not familiar with the bird's 

 ways. 



This article will overtax your readers 

 so I will bring it to a close. During 

 the day my companion secured twenty- 

 nine Cooper's Hawk's eggs, all of which 

 were in excellent shape for an addition 

 to his perfect collection. Four of them 

 were given to the writer of this article, 

 who will sign himself as an 



Old Timer. 



Some Winter Bird-Life- 



A winter tramp, on a sunny day, is 

 not so bad, after all, if one is dressed 

 warm but light. To slip on the leggins 

 and shooticg coat, with its assortment 

 of shells in their respective pockets, 

 shoulder the twelve guage and leaving 

 the town and its millions of Sparrows, 

 walk up the valley along the creek into 

 and through the the woods and groves, 

 and visit the springs where it is well to 

 see that the gun is not loaded with dust 

 shot, and to be ready for a pair of Fish 

 Ducks (Hooded), or perhaps a small 

 flock of that greatest of all Ducks, the 

 Mallard for here, where it rarely, if 

 ever, freezes, is where we will find the 

 first two on my list of winter birds. Of 

 course neither are as abundant during 

 the coldest winter months as in other 

 parts of the year, but occasionally you 

 will strike them and one Mallard in 

 December is worth a half dozen Black- 

 heads or other Duck during the best of 

 the fall shooting. 



Here, at the spring, we will probably 



see Chickadee too, that gay little black- 

 capped fellow who comes into our 

 yards and around our door on the 

 coldest January mornings, with his 

 merry chick-a-dee-dee. begging for 

 crumbs. His near relative, the White- 

 breasted Nuthatch, another hardy resi- 

 dent of our northern states, will prob- 

 ably be found not far away. His 

 queer note, the guank, quank, can be 

 heard a great distance in the sharp 

 morning air and sometimes we make 

 quite a long walk before we come up 

 to him, scrambling up and down some 

 large forest tree, over the limbs and 

 under them, — no Woodpecker can rival 

 him in this, his method of breakfast 

 hunting 



As we turn to leave the spring a loud 

 can:, caw, caw suddenly attracts our 

 attention upward, and there, over the 

 grove to' our right, flying in a bee line 

 for somewhere, and probably knowing 

 exactly where he is bound for, is a sin- 

 gle Crow, no, not single for there, over 

 the trees, another one appears, two 

 more, and another, all tiling after the 

 leader. No use to dodge down now, 

 they see you already and turn up and 

 to the left, far out of range of the gun. 

 To capture a Crow this time of year re- 

 quires much patience, and you can 

 rarely do it by hiding as they appear, 

 coming your way, they always turn out. 

 I have laid in wait in a corn field in the 

 late fall, when the youngsters had 

 grown as wild and wary as their par- 

 ents, for a full hour, before I got a shot 

 at one, and before I came they were 

 flying continually over my hiding place. 

 After 1 was there, however, they 

 seemed to ''smell a rat" and always 

 turned out for me. Finally though, an 

 extra large single bird — you have pro- 

 bably noticed that single birds are al- 

 ways more easily deceived than flocks 

 —came flying directly over me and paid 

 the penalty for his carelessness by re- 

 ceiving my charge of seven, full force, 

 and his shiny black skin now lies on its 



