98 



THE NIDIOLOGIST. 



NOTES ON THE GOLDEN EAGLE. 



The illustration on the first page shows 

 a nest of the Golden Eagle, which I photo- 

 graphed in Santa Clara county with a small 

 "Kodac" camera and had enlarged. It 

 contained but one immaculate egg. Other 

 eggs would have been laved, probably 

 richly-marked ones (for this is the case 

 ordinarily when the first egg is unspotted), 

 had it not been for a blundering, over- 

 zealous egg collector. I know it, for I 



am he. 



On the 28th day of February, for I had 

 determined to be beforehand with Brother 

 Steinbeck of Hollister and others, I ar- 

 rived in the territory of the Golden Eagle. 

 After dinner, in the gathering gloom, I 

 started off from Sargent's to visit my near- 

 est Eagle's nest. It was a long walk, and 

 before I got to the tree it grew dark. It 

 is not particularly "healthy" to tackle an 

 Eagle's nest after nightfall, as I knew from 

 the wild experience of a friend, so that 

 when the great nest was in sight, with the 

 big Eagle's tail silhouetted over its edge 

 against the sky, I had a sudden attack of 

 heart palpitation. That Eagle po.sitively 

 refused to fly ! And as I climbed nearer, 

 gripping fiercely onto a piece of fence rail, 

 I proceeded to pound on a limb and uttered 

 the war-whoop of a Comanche. 



Then the Eagle, king of the air, rose 

 and swooped off into the blackness — and I 

 breathed ea.sier. The one white egg was 

 in the nest, and that is all I got three days 

 later, for after that wild yell of mine the 

 Eagle never once dared to come back. 



This nest was only about 35 feet above 

 the ground, in a small live oak, on a hill- 

 side. 



The object next to the egg in the picture 

 is a ' '.soap root, ' ' a fact most interesting to 

 me, as it is another proof of the individu- 

 ality of this pair of Golden Eagles, of 

 which I wrote several years ago. Every 

 year, in lining this nest, the birds add a 

 soap root; a talisman which has failed sig- 

 nally to keep off the evil-intentioiied egg 

 collector. Before the present nest was 

 built the Eagles on my first acquaintance 

 with them had a .soap root in their old nest. 



The bald summit of a hill I have named 

 "Round Top" is a favorite playground of 

 one of these Eagles. Every spring, for 

 years, I have observed the Eagle at certain 

 hours, walking about on the summit of this 

 hill. It is a good place for an Eagle's play- 

 ground, for it commands the approaches in 

 every direction. 



The next day after my arrival I started 

 off with a saddle horse and visited an 

 Eagle's nest in a live-oak grove on the side 

 of a creek. The bird flew from her three 

 handsome eggs as I climbed the tree. The 

 nest was about fifty feet up, four feet wide 

 and two and one-half feet in depth exteri- 

 orly; built of oak sticks and lined with 

 green oak leaves and " Spanish moss." 

 The nest proper was unusually hollowed, 

 being five inches deep; width about four- 

 teen inches. A partly eaten squirrel, the 

 chief article of diet of the San Benito 

 count}^ Eagles, was on the side of the nest. 



I visited several other nests, ail empty 

 except one, which contained a set of two. 

 I recognized the eggs when I saw them. 

 This is not facetious, but fact. I had never 

 seen those pirticular eggs before, but had 

 seen their counterpart, layed by the same 

 Eagle in the same nest. Thus, in studying 

 the habits of a number of particular pairs 

 of Eagles from year to year, I have discov- 

 ered that the eggs var3' but little, being 

 easily rocognizable by me as belonging to 

 individual Eagles by their size, shape and 

 markings. How far this is true of all birds 

 remains to be seen. 



When I returned home I had ten eggs of 

 the Golden Eagle, and was pretty well sat- 

 isfied with my four days' trip. B3' years 

 of collecting I have these Eagles' nests all 

 "staked out." But any thought I might 

 have had of controling the Eagle egg mar- 

 ket has been dashed to earth. In the lan- 

 guage of the mugwump I am no longer "in 

 it." A letter received by me a few days 

 since from a Mr. J. F. Lewis of Capitola, 

 Cal., has discomfited me entirely. He 

 writes to know the value of Eagles' eggs, 

 having been told they were worth $8 or 

 $10 apiece, and says: "I have two Eagles 

 I got from a nest six years ago, one of 

 which laid two egg.s last year, and three 

 this year." Mr. Lewis has intentions — I 

 can see that — and just as soon as he gets 

 his Eagle farm in good running order in 

 his back yard I am going to quit. Lattin 

 will be giving away Eagle's eggs as a pre- 

 mium, with one coupon. 



Harry R. Taylor. 



