Y8 I^'IKD STUDIKS WITH A CAMERA 



the frog'like monotone of the young is broken by 

 the sudden qiiait']{s of their parents. 



The rookerj' is in a low part of the woods which 

 evidently is flooded early in the yeai', a fact which 

 may have influenced the Hei'ons in their sclectinii 

 of the locality as a nesting site. At the time of 

 our visit tlie swamj) maples, in vhicli the nests arc 

 placed, wcrc^ densely undergrowji. with ferns, and 

 as we approached the whitened vegetation, whicli 

 clearly marked thi' limits of the rookery, a number 

 of Herons with scpiawks of alarm left the vicinity 

 of their nests, and soon the rookery was ill an up- 

 roar. The common (pia/rk note was often heai-d, 

 but many of the calls were distinctly galline in 

 character and conveyed the imi}ression that we had 

 invaded a henroost. 



The trees in which the nests were placed are very 

 tall and slender, mere poles some of them, with a 

 single nest whore the branches fork ; while those 

 more heavily limbed had four, five,^'* and even six of 

 the platforms of sticks, which with Herons serve as 

 nests, but in oidy a single instance was one nest 

 placed directly below another. A conservative count 

 yielded a total of five hundred and tw(^nty-five nests, 

 all within a circle about one hundred yards in diam- 

 eter, nearly every suitable tree holding one or more, 

 the lowest being about thirty feet from the ground, 

 the highest at least eighty feet above it. 



While the limy deposits a-nd partially digested 

 fish drop])ed by the birds seemed not to affect the 

 growth of the lower vegetation, it had a marked 

 influence on certain of the swamp maples, the <level- 

 opment of the trees whi(-li Indd a number of nests 



