Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1873-12-17
Che family Circle.
FiSh-HaWkS anu their Nests.

O~* cE"<****U SA*NA*s
FiSh-HaWkS ana their Nests.
L spent the summer at little hamlet
on the New Jersey coast, and of all the
strange and interesting things | saw there,
nothing was stranger or more interesting
than these birds of which | Want to tell
you. La poetry and science they are al
ways called "ospreys." That may be a
prettier word, but fsh-hawks is the better
by all fishermen on our coast, and it is
more descriptive of the birds and their
habits.
A broad, shallow river, which was only
the sea pushing back into the land, ran
just in the rear of our boarding house,
and there, all day long, we could watch
the 6sh-hawks circling above or swooping
down from great heights, or diving heads
long into the water, or sitting solemn and
grave upon their nests. As soon as you
come within sound of the ocean, you may
see these large, pouchshaped nests, wedged
and other strong trees, sometimes ten,
sometimes Fifty feet above the ground.
They are placed, without any attempt at
concealment, in the open fields, or close to
the fishers houses, or along the river
banks, perhaps half mile inland and
they perform a wonderfully picturesque
feature in the landscape. They are built
on large sticks, three and four feet long,
mixed with corn-stalks, sea-weed and mul-
len-stocks, piled up four or five feet in a
solid mass, and lined with sea-weed. They
are not hollow like pouch, as you mi ght
judge from the outside, but are nearly fat
on top, and about as deep as dinner
plate.
Of course they are very heavy, and the
weight, together with the mass OF wet
stuff, saps the vitality from the tree in a
few years, and it gets bare and ragged.
This great weight is necessary, however,
for it enables the nests to resist the storms
and high winds which sweep over our east
ern shore. And strength is what is main
ly needed for the fish hawk builds its
nest as we do our houses, to last great
many years.
Ask any one of the old fishermen about
them, and be will probably say first
Wall, they're Gurus fowl. No mat
ter about what the weather may be, they
come on the 2lst day Of March, of each
year, all at once and the 2lst of Septem>
Der you can't see one. They 60 over
night and no man from Maine to Georgia
can tell where they 60 to-
They say, too, taat the same birds come
back to the same nest every year. Ii it
has been injured by the winters storms it
is carefully repaired sometimes even re-
built entirely in the same place with the
same material. One morning in the early
spring passed the ruins of large nest
which had been blown down by the wind
of the night before. 1t was great mass
of stuff, scattered all around, and would
have filled a good-sized cart. The homeless
birds were flying about in great distress,
Tapping their wings and uttering their Pc
culiar, shrill note-a note that is in strange
hormony with the melancholy sea. In a
week passed again and the ground was
cleared of the wreck and the nest doomed
up large as ever in the tree from which it
had been blown. There is no doubt that
many of the nests are very old. lu the
field through which we walked on our way
to the beach, was nest which | was as
sured was hundred years old GAS old
as them ceder rails on that fence yonder,"
said the man; "my grandfather told me
So" believed it then. of course, for
ones grandfather always speaks the truth.
You will suppose that a bird which
BULLS such large nests must lay large eggs
and many of them, but this bird never lays
more than three, and they are little larger
than hens egg, of reddish yellow,
splotched with brown. They are laid
about the first of May, and it takes long
and patient sitting till the last of June to
hatch them. During the time and after
the young birds come. the care of the pa
rents is unceasing. The nest is never left
unngarded. The male bird goes fishing and
keeps his family well supplied with food,
while the female rarely leaves her nest.
but keeps over it tireless watch. If any
one approaches she cries shrilly and hovers
over her brood, with her wings outspread
and her piercing eyes flashing, Peaceable
and gentle at other times, she will defend
her nest with claws and beak against the
enemy or too curious intruder.
The young fsh-hawks are the funniest
things you ever saw, awkward and misshap-
pen, and vet with such a wise, digni6ed
expression! l watched for several hours
couple learning to fly. They sat bal
anced on the edge of the nest, solemn aud
grave as judges. and looked as if they had
come out of the she'll knowing everything
The old birds were coaxing and going
through various exercises which [ suppose
we're the first principles of flying, and the
Young ones tilted about and rolled over and
finally got fastened between the sharp
branches of the tree. The mother and faith
er fused and .colded, IS Bill-ee, Bill-ee, Stu
pid-i-ty.' The young are very slow in learn
ing to fly, and have heard that they often
linger in the nest long after they are well
able to help themselves, to be fed and
waited upon. till driven away by the pa
rents, who beat them out with their wings,
and peck them With their sharp beaks. |
dent like to think tbs, but it may be SO,
for one day we found a young bird droop-
ing on the fence. He allowed US to come
very close to him. and We discovered that
his wing was broken. 1t was not shot, SC
he must have fallen in his effort to fy. No
birds were near him, he had evidently beer
deserted. He looked forlorn and pitiful, SC
we took him home and put him in the