THE OOLOQI8T 



29 



about when to go again and collect 

 them. Although it may seem much 

 easier to wait until the bird is sitting 

 and find the nest by flushing its owner 

 from it you are very liable to have 

 trouble because of incubation if you 

 depend on that method, and it fre- 

 frequently is not only possible but 

 quite as easy to find the nest long be- 

 fore the full set has been laid. 



It is a good plan to go afield and ob- 

 serve what birds are about your terri- 

 tory, and if it is the proper time for a 

 species you see to be nesting, to im- 

 mediately begin to look in suitable 

 places for the nest, whether the bird's 

 actions betray its whereabouts or not. 

 Some birds do show plainly by their 

 actions when their nests are being ap- 

 proa'ched but many species slip out of 

 your way quietly and disappear, and 

 you would seldom find the nest by 

 watching the birds until it was too 

 late to save the eggs in good condition. 



It is well to make a list of all birds 

 known to breed in your territory, be- 

 ginning with the very earliest date on 

 which a full set of any species has 

 been found, and following in the order 

 of time in which the various species 

 have their nests until your list is com- 

 plete. I simply rule sheets of ordin- 

 ary letter paper, (size eleven by eight 

 and a half inches), into five vertical 

 columns of varying width to suit the 

 entries, and in these columns, reading 

 horizontally from left to right I make 

 the following entries,— in the first 

 column the earliest known date when 

 a full set of the species was found, in 

 the second column the common name 

 of the bird, in the third column the 

 average dates between which the ma- 

 jority of that particular species have 

 a full set, in the next column the num- 

 ber of eggs which is considered a set, 

 and in the last column, under the 

 heading of remarks, anything of 

 special interest, such as the usual 



location of the nest, or in the 

 case of rare breeders some of 

 the actual dates and localities where 

 they have been taken 



To start wtih get as much data as 

 you can from publications referring to 

 birds of regions as near as possible to 

 the ground you wish to collect on, and 

 then you can make additions from 

 time to time from your own observa- 

 tions. By carrying in your pocket a 

 carefully compiled list such as des- 

 cribed you can easily and quickly find 

 out what nests to expect at any given 

 date in the season; and when you see 

 a bird whose nesting habits you are 

 unfamiliar with you can get a fair idea 

 whether or not it is time for it to be 

 breeding, and it may save you many 

 a weary hour of searching for a nest 

 before the birds have made it, or when 

 it is too late in the season to find eggs 

 which can be saved for the cabinet. 

 But remember that many birds have 

 two or more broods in a season and 

 if you can not find tneir first nest you 

 may be lucky enough to find a later 

 one. Many birds ordinarily lay but 

 one set a season but if that set hap- 

 pens to be destroyed some of them lay 

 another clutch, sometimes in the same 

 nest, but more often I think in a new 

 nest built at no great distance from 

 the first one. For this reason it is 

 sometimes possible to get fresh eggs 

 at a much later date than your .aver- 

 age dates would indicate and it is well 

 to be on the watch for all such occur- 

 rences. Carefully record all data pos- 

 sible about any nest which you find or 

 the actions of its owners, for the num- 

 ber of nests you can discover general- 

 ly depends directly on how sharp an 

 observer you are. 



As a list of this kind is for field use 

 it is well to sew the sheets of paper 

 together at the top, (or along the left 

 side if you prefer), so as to prevent 

 them from being separated or lost in 

 the field. 



