52 



THE OOLOGIST 



THE OLD ORCHARD ON THE HILL 



When you were a small boy — in the 

 days when you were starting that 

 "private museum," and each of the in- 

 numerable wonders of the living world 

 thrilled you with fresh delight — were 

 your slumbers ever disquieted by 

 dreams of marvelous bird's nest? Did 

 you ever dream of a prodigious nest 

 in a certain apple tree, in a certain 

 old orchard, "Oh, gee, such an easy 

 climb!" and when you had shinned up 

 the tree, in your subconscious imagi- 

 nation, did you behold a nest with "All 

 different kinds" of eggs in it — a whole 

 collection? 



It was some such reminisence as 

 this that caused the nicker of a smile 

 which my companion noticed on my 

 face as we rounded Indian Point and 

 found the prow of our canoe pointed 

 toward an old deserted orchard at the 

 top of a hill which sloped abruptly to 

 the water's edge. It was enveloped in 

 the mystery of gathering dusk, and I 

 thinking it would be a good place to 

 look for one of those mythical nests. 

 It was the twenty-ninth of May, and 

 we were canoeing on a chain of small 

 lakes in northern Illinois. It was too 

 late in the day to stop for bird work. 

 We pulled the canoe up to the landing 

 of a small summer hotel which was 

 our objective point, and took lodgings 

 there for the night. 



The following morning I strolled 

 along a path which led to the little or- 

 chard. A Song Sparrow flitted ner- 

 vously from a dense clump of grass 

 near the path and I stopped to look 

 for its nest. It was at the roots of a 

 tree, well hidden by the thick grass, 

 and contained three eggs of the spar- 

 row and two eggs of the Cowbird. 

 Passing on through a patch of under- 

 brush, I came to the hill and the or- 

 chard at its top. It was a disappoint- 

 ment. The orchard was too small to 

 hold any promise as a bird retreat. 



There were barely a dozen apple trees, 

 and beyond them a deserted cabin, an 

 old outhouse, a couple of large lilac 

 bushes and two evergreen trees. It 

 was all surrounded by open pasture. 



It did not take long to search such 

 a place as that. I found one nest; not 

 an immense nest with a whole oologi- 

 cal collection, but an ordinary nest 

 with three Kingbird's eggs. It was 

 on a horizontal limb of one of the old 

 decrepit apple trees, and was so well 

 hidden from below that I began to 

 question if I might not have missed 

 some other well hidden nest. I had 

 searched the orchard pretty well, I 

 thought, but I would look through it 

 again. Just then a Baltimore Oriole 

 attracted my attention in another tree. 

 This was interesting! Where could 

 she have kept herself while I was 

 examining that tree a little while be- 

 fore? I seated myself, kept quiet, 

 and watched. The result was a nest 

 of this species only fourteen feet from 

 the ground and so completely hidden 

 in a bunch of leaves at the end of a 

 branch, that it was difficult to believe 

 a nest was really hanging there. This 

 nest contained four eggs at that time. 

 (On the second of June these had 

 ben supplemented by a cowblrd's egg 

 and another egg of the oriole). This 

 find both pleased and chagrined me, 

 for I had risked my neck just a few 

 days before to bring down my first 

 nest of the Baltimore, from a tall and 

 inhospitable oak tree. 



I had again renewed the search of 

 the orchard and was scanning every 

 twig with mechanical precision when 

 I was starteled to see what I was 

 looking for; another nest. It was evi- 

 dently a vireo's nest but I did not 

 succeed in identifying it, and left it 

 undisturbed. It contained one egg. 

 When I examined the big lilac bush 

 near the old cabin, I found that it con- 

 tained a Catbird's nest, with a com- 



