166 HOMING WITH THE BIRDS 



old birds were coming constantly, each by a private 

 route, to feed the young. The male at each ap- 

 proach to the nest flew to the end of a twig on 

 which the nest was located. This branch was 

 alive and small apples were sticking up around the 

 nest, but the extreme tip, on which the bird alighted 

 from a higher point in his route, was dead and 

 bare so that every natural history point possible 

 to include in one picture was shown almost every 

 time he alighted. Noticing this, I decided to 

 move the camera a few feet, focus it on the tip 

 of the branch, and see if I could secure a picture 

 of him during the instant he perched there before 

 he flew to the nest. After he had left from one 

 feeding I moved the camera, made the focus as 

 sharp as possible, and retired to hiding. The 

 picture I secured was made the first time he 

 alighted on the twig. As he struck it, he noticed 

 the camera was in a difi^erent position. He drew 

 back his head, but did not move his body. The 

 picture shows him breast toward the camera, his 

 head slightly turned to one side, which resulted in 

 giving the exact shape of his beak, his eye, the 

 height and rounding of his crest, his wings not 

 tightly folded to his sides, his feet both in view as 

 they naturally grasped the twig, his tail wide- 

 spread showing the white border, his pose alert. I 

 scarcely see how it would be possible to crowd 

 more interesting points into one reproduction of a 

 bird, while on his face is plainly to be seen the 



