i: 
TIIK CONDOR 
Vol. XIII 
owlets as tlie>- were scrambling along the ground and evidently still unable to fly. 
The girls rejiorted the strange creatures to a hired man who was temiiorarily in the 
neighborhood and he hunted up the “varmints'’ and clubbed them to death. The 
real neighbors of the owls would not have done this. They were all interested in 
the big birds and all rejiorted that their large flocks of chickens had not suffered 
from their i)resence. 
A further word should be added on the behavior of the adult birds during the 
first season. With two of us at the nest their demonstrations, although energetic 
enough, never proved dangerous, both l)irds merel_\’ came near, fl\-ing back and 
forth' [^at distances varying from thirt\' to a hundred feet, sna])]nng their 
mandibles, ruffling their feathers, and hooting out vigorous jmotests. It was 
different when one person was at the nest alone. On Aimil 2S I had arrived at the 
I'ig. S. MARCH ,lu, 1007; THE KKGINN'IN(,;S OK I XTEI.I. UiKN'CH; OWEKTS KIGIITKEX 
To TWKXTV-TWO D.AVS OED 
old elm about twent\- minutes ahead of Mr. burge and. standing on the next to the 
top round of a twenty-foot ladder, was making some examination of the >-oung and 
the otlier contents of the nest cavit>-. The ladder necessarily stood as nearly vertical 
as possible to reach the cavity at all and, as the big tree was about five feet in dia- 
meter just below the hollow, the hold was none too secure. Fortunately a small 
horizontal branch .shot out from the heav\’ trunk on the northeast side and against 
this the to]) three inches of the ladder found some su])]>ort. Without this I dislike 
to think what might have ha]>i)ened when that stunning blow came in from the 
south (juarter. It came ab.solutel>' une.xi)ected and was so violent as to leave 
the left side of m\- head (piite numb. With m\' hand I discovered that blood was 
running down m\- cheek and a quick glance around showed my assailant stepi)ing 
