HUNTING WITH A MICROPHONE 



699 



sound recording, had been assigned to the 

 expedition by the Dean of the College as 

 the sound technician. Dr. George Sutton, 

 Curator of Birds at Cornell, was to accom- 

 pany the expedition as bird artist until we 

 should find the ivory-billed woodpecker — 

 a rather indefinite commission. James Tan- 

 ner, a graduate student in ornithology at 

 Cornell, was to accompany the expedition 

 as general handy man to assist in both the 

 sound recording and the photography. Mr. 

 Brand and the author were to plan the 

 itinerary and take charge of the photog- 

 raphy and the ornithological observations. 



One of the first objects of the expedition 

 was the rediscovery of the ivory-billed 

 woodpecker, perhaps the rarest of the 

 North American birds and at one time 

 thought to be extinct.* 



In central Florida in 1924 the author 

 and Mrs, Allen had discovered a pair that 

 were later collected by local taxidermists, 

 and the expedition planned to spend March 

 in the same general region of Florida search- 

 ing for another survivor. Whenever con- 

 ditions were suitable, of course, we would 

 catch the songs of other birds as well. 



LEAVES NO LONGER WHISPER, THEY 

 SHOUT 



It must be realized that when the song 

 of a bird is amplified enough to cause 

 a recording lamp to flicker sufficiently to 

 make a record on the film, every other 

 sound is amplified too. Many a time rec- 

 ords of beautifully clear songs are rendered 

 worthless by the passing of an automobile 

 a block away or even by the rustling of a 

 slight breeze among the leaves. The whis- 

 pering leaves of the poets are shouting 

 leaves to the sound recorder; the babbling 

 brooks no longer babble; they roar. 



So each morning we arose at daybreak 

 before the milk trucks, the tractors, the 

 roosters, the hounds, and the innumerable 

 other sounds of civilization became too fre- 

 quent, and recorded the voices of such fa- 

 miliar Florida birds as the mockingbird, 

 the cardinal, the Florida wren, and the 

 ground dove. 



When conditions were inauspicious for 

 recording, we spent long hours and covered 

 many miles hunting for ivorybills. On 

 some of these trips we obtained records or 

 films of such unusual species as the sand- 



* See "Woodpeckers, Friends of Our Forests," 

 by T, Gilbert Pearson, National Geogkaphic 

 Magazine, April, 1933. 



hill crane, the southern bald eagle, the 

 American egret, the wood ibis, and the Au- 

 dubon's caracara, which is near the north- 

 ern limit of its range on the Kissimmee 

 Prairie. 



Nor were our labors ended with the set- 

 ting sun, for we were always looking for 

 ideal conditions to record the evening con- 

 certs of the barred owls, the limpkins, and 

 the chuck-will's-widows. 



One of the unusual places we visited in 

 Florida was "Manywings," the home of Mr. 

 W. E. Browne near Grandin. Here the 

 familiar garden birds have grown so tame 

 that they come to his call, and nine or ten 

 species have learned to catch from the air 

 fragments of peanuts which he tosses to 

 them (page 702). 



The blue jays, which are particularly 

 wary in most places, are especially adept 

 at darting from the trees like flycatchers to 

 snatch the titbits in mid-air. Most re- 

 markable of all is the tameness of a Florida 

 crane which comes to the back door for 

 cornbread. 



While we were recording the voices of 

 some of Mr. Browne's birds and the truck 

 door stood open, an inquisitive Florida 

 wren so quickly accepted us into the fam- 

 ily that she carried nesting material into 

 the truck. Before Mr. Kellogg realized it, 

 she had made a good start on her nest at 

 his elbow, as if she would induce him to 

 remain and make his home with her. What 

 greater show of hospitality has Florida to 

 offer ? 



CHALLENGING AN UNSEEN RIVAL 



Quite different was our experience in 

 Winter Park when we were testing some of 

 the film we had exposed. We had our 

 projector set up inside the house with the 

 window partly open. One after another 

 the songs of different Florida birds poured 

 from the loud-speaker with nothing to dis- 

 turb our critical ears until the song of a 

 mockingbird came on. 



Then, as the liquid notes began to vibrate 

 across the room, we became aware of a 

 tapping at the window and there, fluttering 

 against the pane, was our favorite garden 

 mocker bristling with resentment. This 

 house and garden were his, and he obvi- 

 ously objected to any other mockingbird 

 singing in his territory. 



When we placed the loud-speaker in the 

 garden and played the mockingbird's song 

 again, it was almost pathetic to watch the 



