ISSUED IN BEHALF OF THE SCIENCE WHICH IT ADVOCATES. 



Volume III, 



FEBRUARY, 1878. 



Number 12. 



Methods of Climbing for Nests. 



BY FRED. J. DAVIS. 



N an article in the June number of| 

 The Oologist, which has been wide- 

 ly copied, Mr. W. H. Ballon gives 



ideas of climbing, which, though 

 they contain some good suggestions, differ 

 so essentially from mine, that I deem it a 

 duty to correct the (to me) inaccuracies it 

 contains. In the first place he says : "•On 

 the whole climbing irons are a failure, for, 

 unless a person has a strong brain and a 

 stout nerve, he can make but little head- 

 way," et cetera. In the second statement 

 I Avill bear him out and say that unless a 

 person has a strong brain and a stout nerve 

 he will do well to confine himself to search- 

 ing for nests on the ground or near it, which 

 offers a wide field for search, and not at- 

 tempt climbing, as he can make but little 

 headway, either with or without irons. 

 But the statement that climbing irons are a 

 failure, I feel myself qualified by that best 

 of all teachers, experience, to emphatically 

 deny. On the contrary, I know climbing 

 irons, if properly adjusted and used, to be 

 a most valuable assistant. The irons should 

 be such as are used in climbing telegraph 

 poles, with a good chisel point about an inch 

 or an inch and a half long. They should 



be strapped securely to the boot, and boots 

 should be worn when they are used. The 

 point of one iron should be struck firmly in- 

 to the tree, then the other a little higher up, 

 and so on, taking care to clasp firmly the 

 tree with the arms and hands ; after a little 

 practice, any one possessing the afore-men- 

 tioned brain and nerve can literally walk 

 up a tree. When wishing to rest, both 

 irons should be struck into the tree, and by 

 holding well with the arms, stand until rest- 

 ed. If the tree is very large, the plan of 

 tying a rope around the tree and body and 

 pushing it upward, is just as feasible and 

 efficient with irons as without. The mis- 

 take most young climbers make is, that 

 irons ought to enable them to walk up a tree 

 without any exertion on their part. Now 

 I do not claim any such extraordinary pow- 

 ers for the irons ; I simply say with ordi- 

 nary care and skill, they will enable the 

 climber to do four times the work with one 

 half the trouble and exhaustion that could 

 be accomplished in any other way. In 

 support of this I could cite numerous pi'oofs, 

 but will content myself with one in my own 

 experience. 



In the spring of 1874 I found a nest of 

 the Red-tailed Hawk {Buteo horealis) in a 

 large birch tree about fifty feet from the 

 ground. I had not my irons with me at 

 the time, as it was rather early and I was 

 not anticipating climbing. But the tempta- 



