10 
GAUKRODGER, The Way of an Eagle. [ a* juTy 
assistant would take to the chicken each day a sheep’s kidney or 
chop to augment the parent’s supply of lizards, as no doubt my 
constant intrusions were interfering considerably with the regu¬ 
larity of the baby’s meals. The chick would take the meat readily 
enough from my assistant. The latter, however, was particularly 
careful to serve it from the end of a pointed stick, as the sight 
of a bare hand was sufficient to arouse the youngster to a display 
of that nasty snatching habit with his talons. 
The pictures showing the wings raised were taken with a 
5 x 4 Soho Reflex camera, fitted with a whole-plate lens working 
at 6.3, and having a focal-plane shutter set at 1-300 sec. One or 
two other pictures were obtained by using a Dallon telephoto lens 
on the same camera. 
The series of photographs indicates, by the growth of the 
chicken, that considerable time elapsed between the taking of the 
first and last pictures. To be precise, the first was taken on 
September 23rd, and the last on November 24th, 1923. 
It must not be surmised that this series comprises the whole 
of the exposures made. Several were failures owing to unfav¬ 
ourable light and wind; and other plates came to grief owing to 
accidents in handling or developing. I regretted very much losing 
an excellent exposure by accidently dropping the plate when 
partly developed. This showed the young bird qualifying for a 
future soaring “stunt”; it was depicted fully a foot above the 
nest, with wings outspread, taking advantage of a strong breeze 
to keep itself almost stationary in the air. 
Generally speaking, these attempts to portray by photography 
'*the way of an Eagle” meant considerable arduous labour, 
coupled with patience and determination. Nevertheless, all was 
useful experience from a nature photographer’s point of view, 
and all went to assist in observing the many peculiarities and 
general habits of this majestic and interesting bird, so that, after 
all, I look back with pleasure on my thirteen weeks’ study of the 
Wedge-tail family. Matters certainly would have been much 
easier had the season been favourable from a grazier’s point of 
view; as the case was, my primary attention had to be given to 
station work; otherwise, I am sure, I could have improved my 
series considerably. 
In looking over my field note-book, I find on record that, on 
the day after the young birds were hatched, around and under 
the nest were remains of twenty-four lizards of various kinds. 
This was an indication that one parent bird found food for the 
other during, at least, the latter days of incubation; but I could 
not determine whether or not both birds took turns in incubating, 
It was clear to me, however, that one parent gave more attention 
to providing food for the chickens; this bird, I assumed to be the 
male, it being the smaller of the two. The larger and much 
sleeker bird seen carrying the small bloodwood branch came on 
several occasions without either branch or food; but she (?) 
seemed to make a close inspection of the nest as if taking stock 
as to its cleanliness and the amount of food the youngster had 
