654 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[April 23, 1910. 
think it is certainly much too long throughout 
the South. A longer close season is most 
urgently required. 
On several occasions toward the latter part 
of my stay, when returning from a day of sport 
at dusk, I was privileged to hear the strange 
love melody of the woodcock’s night song, of 
■which mention has been made from time to time 
in Forest and Stream. The birds were begin¬ 
ning to mate preparatory to the northward ad¬ 
vance, and to hear it once is to remember it 
always. Who would think from so grotesque 
a bird could issue sounds so sweet. 
Charles B. Morss. 
New York City, April n .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: Since sending the note last week about 
the woodcock’s song I find there is a little varia¬ 
tion in the habits of the birds. I went out and 
watched two males paying attention to one fe¬ 
male. One of the males would bleat like a night 
hawk several times in succession before spring¬ 
ing into the air, and when at a height something 
over one hundred yards, began to exchange the 
wing note for the vocal note, but with alterna¬ 
tions of the two, beginning the purely vocal 
note while completing his last circle on high, 
and continuing the vocal note all the way dur¬ 
ing the period of descent to the grpund. The 
other male, perhaps through anxiety, and feel¬ 
ing not so sure of his hold on the affections of 
the female, did not stop to bleat at all, but circled 
at a lower altitude than the first one and did his 
•warbling during the descent only. 
Robert T. Morris. 
Through the kindness of Edward A. Eames 
we have seen No. 2, of Vol. IX., of the Bulletin 
of the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences, con¬ 
taining '‘Notes on the American Woodcock,” by 
Ottomar Reinecke, of Buffalo, N. Y. The paper 
is full of matter interesting to all sportsmen who 
love the little brown fellow and is beautifully 
illustrated by a number of photographs of wood¬ 
cock sitting on their nests and of woodcock’s 
eggs in the nests. 
Mr. Reinecke—as have many other people 
familiar with the bird—points out that it is one 
of the earliest of the birds to nest. Sometimes 
this early nesting is followed by unhappy conse¬ 
quences, as in cases which took place in the 
spring of 1904. The author says: ‘Tn our lo¬ 
cality the 13th of April is usually the time to 
look for full sets of woodcock’s eggs. That year 
was no exception to the rule, although at the 
time referred to we had been visited by a heavy 
snowfall which covered the ground to the depth 
of eight inches. The snow had been partially 
melted by the sun, but was frozen hard during 
the ensuing night. Two days later another snow 
storm occurred. The next morning found us on 
the ground which is an ideal locality for the 
nesting of this bird. The ground was then cov¬ 
ered with about five inches of crusted snow. In 
company with several friends we immediately 
began our search for the woodcock. We soon 
found the tr’acks of a pair where they had been 
feeding or trying to find food around partly 
frozen water holes. 
“We flushed the birds and began looking the 
snow-covered ground over carefully for the nest. 
We found none in that vicinity, but following 
the tracks of a single bird, which evidently were 
made the previous day, we came to the spot at 
least a quarter of a mile distant where the bird 
had started on its walk to the water holes. On 
examining the place nothing but a slight depres¬ 
sion was found, appearing somewhat dirtier than 
the otherwise clean snow. 
“We were beginning to think that the bird 
had taken this place in a small clump of bushes 
as a refuge from the snow storms when it was 
suggested that perhaps after all the nest might 
be under the hard frozen snow. This was no 
sooner suggested than we were down > on our 
knees, taking turns at melting the snow with 
our breath. After a few .minutes we were re¬ 
warded by the sight of one egg, and continuing 
our efforts we found a fine set of four eggs, 
the first lying directly in the middle and on top 
of the three other eggs and being separated from 
them by a layer of at least an inch of snow. 
From this I take it that when the first snow 
storm came, the bird had laid only three eggs 
and found difficulty in keeping on them for any 
great length of time. The woodcock lives on 
worms from a soft iuarshy ground and conse¬ 
quently she could not remain a long time on the 
eggs, or possibly the large amount of falling 
snow made the bird continually shift her posi¬ 
tion until by this constant moving the eggs were 
covered with snow; then the next day the other 
egg was deposited as before mentioned. After 
this the second snowfall occurred which the bird 
could not withstand, and so finally deserted nest 
and eggs. We found several more nests in the 
same way on that day and in each case the eggs 
w r ere found as described.” 
Mr. Reinecke records the finding in April, 
1901, of five eggs in a woodcock’s nest on which 
the bird was sketched and from which she was 
afterward frightened. The number is very un¬ 
usual if not previously unexampled. 
In the Gulf Hammock. 
Jacksonville, Fla., April 6. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: Beginning at the mouth of the Suwan¬ 
nee River and extending southward along the 
Gulf coast some thirty or forty miles, is a mass 
of jungle and swamp about ten miles in width 
known as the Gulf Hammock. Tidewater creeks 
and lagoons make back into it from the Gulf, 
and these are well stocked with fish and ’gators. 
Panther, bear, deer, turkeys, wildcats, ’coons, 
’possum and squirrels are found within its bor¬ 
ders, and at the present time I suppose it affords 
cover for as much game as any territory of 
similar size in the State. 
Naturally this hammock attracts the sports¬ 
men, and each season parties from here and else¬ 
where go there on camp hunts. Just before the 
wind-up of the past hunting season a party <|Om- 
posed of W. B. Schuler and C. E. Griesmer, of 
Hamilton, Ohio; Geo. H. Harvey, of Middle- 
town, Ohio; W. P. Gilreath and C. F. Smedley, 
of this city, went by way of the S. A. L. Ry. to 
Elzy, where they were met by a couple of guides 
and the wagons and were taken back into the 
hammock some miles w'here a camp was estab¬ 
lished. 
Mr. Schuler, who is a fine revolver and rifle 
shot, devoted a good portion of his time to 
hunting squirrels with the revolver, and some 
of the bunches of grays he brought into camp 
made the colored cook wish for an assistant. 
One evening Mr. Gilreath and one of the 
guides were keeping watch near the edge of a 
lagoon bordered by giant cypress trees where 
they had hopes of roosting some turkeys. Just 
before dusk they saw a flock of twelve or fifteen 
about 200 yards distant and were congratulating 
themselves on their luck when there was a flash 
of tawny yellow among the turkeys and a great 
beating of wings as they cleared the ground. 
When the hunters returned to camp and told 
how a panther had flushed their game, it was 
hinted by the other members of the party that 
a wildcat looked as big as a lion in the dusky 
solitude of a jungle. An inspection of the tracks 
the following morning, however, showed the 
animal to have been a panther. 
As a deer hunt the trip was a disappointment. 
Though the hounds jumped several, none of the 
party got a shot at one. 
After breaking camp in the hammock a couple 
of days were spent in the pine woods quail shoot¬ 
ing and the sport was all that could be desired. 
On the return of the party to Jacksonville the 
Ohio contingent left for a hunt on the upper St. 
John’s River, where they secured several deer 
and had a fine trip generally. 
While on a shooting trip last January the fol¬ 
lowing snake stories were told me while toast¬ 
ing my feet in front of the fire one night: 
A farmer plowing in a field had his attention 
attracted by the queer antics of a fox squirrel 
in a pine tree a short distance beyond the fence. 
The squirrel would chase up and down the tree, 
then hang head down near the ground and flirt 
its tail angrily. After keeping this up for some 
time it ran down the tree and disappeared. The 
farmer had been speculating as to the cause of 
the squirrel’s actions, and as it failed to re¬ 
appear, he climbed the fence and approached the 
tree. Within a few feet of the tree was a log 
and *on this sat the squirrel perfectly motion¬ 
less. Thinking to capture it, the man stole up 
behind and clapped his felt hat over the animal, 
and as he did so he was struck on the back of 
the hand by a large rattlesnake that had been 
lying coiled on the opposite side of the log. At 
the touch of the hat the squirrel jumped and 
escaped, and as soon as the man realized what 
had happened, he started for his house, only a 
short distance away, and sent for the doctor, 
but in spite of all that could be done to relieve 
him he died within a few hours. The narrator 
said the rattler had charmed the squirrel. 
This one is about a “needle” snake. Old 
readers of Forest and Stream will recall that 
some years ago E. Hough tried to secure a speci¬ 
men of the hoop snake, but if I remember aright 
he had to be content with stories similar to the 
following: 
Some negroes were gathering fodder in a field, 
among them a boy. He was coming toward the 
wagon with a bundle of fodder under each arm 
when he let out a yell and started to run. The 
boy was too badly scared to stop as he neared 
the men, and still hung on to his bundles, while 
in hot pursuit was a “needle” snake, rolling 
along like a big hoop. As the boy passed, the 
men yelled at him to drop the fodder, and as 
he did so the snake shot into it tail first. Be¬ 
fore it could recoil and take up the chase it was 
killed by the men. Geo. A. Irwin. 
