| is no one correct "method" in bird-study, any more than | | | | bill, black crown and throat, gray back, and white under |
| there is in learning to play the piano. Our object is to be | | | | parts. It was busily examining the ends of the |
| able to recognize the birds when we see them, to | | | | branches, sometimes hanging head down, uttering a |
| become as familiar as possible with their habits, haunts, | | | | series of animated notes. |
| and seasons, to find out what and how many species | | | | The best course for beginning to become familiar with |
| are to be found in a region or locality, and perhaps | | | | these groups is to find out in the bird-books what are |
| take photographs of them. So long as we are able to | | | | the principal groups represented in the region where |
| accomplish these results, it makes little difference how | | | | one lives. Then, if possible, go to a museum and |
| we do it; there is no compulsory order or exact | | | | examine a few of the species in each group. In this |
| program. Nevertheless there are things which sooner | | | | way one will get a very vivid idea of family |
| or later must be done and must be learned in some | | | | resemblances, and it will be a mighty help afield. If there |
| way. Suggestions will facilitate progress, and, by | | | | is no museum near, make the same study from |
| avoiding waste of time and through securing greater | | | | pictures of birds. In case there are none at home, the |
| efficiency from the first, the student will advance more | | | | public library may help out. |
| rapidly and avoid becoming discouraged and | | | | In order to be properly equipped for good work it is |
| abandoning the attempt to know the birds. | | | | necessary to secure certain pieces of |
| At the outset, in undertaking to study birds, it will be of | | | | apparatus,notably a field glass and a handbook of |
| great help to have some intelligent idea of the classes | | | | birds. As to the first, I would state emphatically that it is |
| or types of birds with which we may become | | | | not at all necessary to purchase anything expensive or |
| acquainted. Most people know a sparrow, a hawk, or | | | | cumbersome. An ordinary opera glass will do very well. |
| a duck when they see it. There are various kinds or | | | | Combine the qualities of a reasonably high power and |
| species of sparrows, hawks, and ducks, but the | | | | a light weight. It does not necessarily follow that a |
| several species in each of these groups have "a | | | | glass is so very "strong" because it is heavy. What |
| family likeness," certain general characteristics in | | | | one wants in a glass is mainly to be able to see birds |
| common. Now there are not so many of these groups | | | | clearly enough to identify them, and a good ordinary |
| but that one can give a distinct idea of each without | | | | glass of fair size, the best one can get for a moderate |
| too great effort. Then, when a bird is clearly seen, one | | | | expenditure, will suffice for all-round work. Such a glass |
| will have a pretty good idea as to where it belongs, | | | | is as good as any other for work in a swamp, |
| and will only have to compare descriptions of a few | | | | shrubbery, or foliage, where the birds, to be seen at all, |
| species to find the right one. | | | | are encountered at close range. |
| There is a great difference in the state of mind of the | | | | Under conditions of this sort a very high-power glass is |
| person equipped with this knowledge who tries to | | | | not only unnecessary, but distinctly not so good, as it is |
| identify birds and that of another who encounters the | | | | very hard to get the bird in the field of vision and in |
| birds afield without it. I recall most vividly my first | | | | focus. With the ordinary opera glass one can pick up a |
| meeting, when a boy, with a certain common bird, and | | | | bird in the thicket almost instantly, whereas with the |
| how utterly puzzled I was. One day in late autumn, as I | | | | other it becomes a vexatious hunt, and by the time |
| passed through a grove in the suburbs of Boston, I | | | | one has got the range, the bird may very likely have |
| came close upon a tiny bird with a small, rather sharp | | | | departed. |