84 



Bird- Lore 



There is one advantage which this new method of studying birds 

 affords which has not been adequately set forth — that of learning with 

 precision the kind of food brought to nestlings. A skilled observer can 

 stand in his tent and note every kind of fruit and every species of insect 

 brought to the nest, excepting comparatively rare cases when the prey is 

 mutilated or pulverized before it is served. Hitherto information on this 

 head has been very meager because of the uncertainty of watching nesting 

 birds at a distance. If, on the other hand, a young bird is killed in order 

 to examine the contents of its stomach, the possibility of continued obser- 

 vation, which alone can yield much information of value, is at once 

 destroyed. One can, indeed, take the young from the nest and place 

 them in a cage suspended near the nesting bough, or cage the fledglings, 

 and this is but another way of applying the method which uses parental 

 instinct as a chain between old and young. 



The nest with all its surroundings is of less importance to the adult 

 birds than is commonly supposed, especially when the instinct to nourish 

 and protect the young is at its height. During the past three summers I 

 have studied forty nests of wild birds by the method of controlling the 

 site, and using the tent for a blind, while the accidents, which came 

 mainly from inexperience, could be counted on the fingers of one hand. 

 When we think of the thousands of eggs taken each year by the misguided 

 collectors, or the hundreds of birds shot to see what they have in their 

 stomachs, this record seems fairly good, but it does not satisfy me. The 

 death roll which science exacts is already large enough. In our studies of 

 animal behavior it is life and not death which we wish to perpetuate. 



FEMALE CHEBEC, OR LEAST FLYCATCHER, STANDING WITH WINGS SPREAD 



OVER HER YOUNG TO WARD OFF THE HEAT 



Lens, Zeiss Anastigmat, Series iia, 6% inch, speed /'8, stop 32, time 1-5 second, distance about 



30 inches in full sun. Northfield. N. H. July 2, 1901 



