The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-06-04

/ common with nlin.F
1t is his delight TO perch upon the high
est bow of the oak and remain mute until
! the yard is filed with heus leading their
| spring broods in search of food. suddenly
| from his tiny throat sounds the shrlll,
| terrible scream of the guessing hawk,
| and as the chickens scurry to shelter he
| gives hoarse imitation of laughter,
dancing excitedly up and doVp and flap
ping his wings in delicious JOY. He can
neither understand nor pardon their terror,
| for the hooking bird next TO the king
| bird is the greatest fighter Tor his WeiSht
| in the archaeological kingdom and fears
no foe. He will chase any hawk that APP
| pears near his home or attack and defeat
| a crow that attempts 10 despon his young.
| He Is chased in turn only by the king
| bird, called here the bee martin. though
occasionally his pugnacity gets the better
| of hisa discretion and a battle royal fol-
lows
The hooking bird varies in song capac-
| ity just as men and women do The one
now near the Wyche home, according to
| Wyche, is a treasure. The naturalist has
| not been Getting much sleep of late, be-
| cause the nights are mconlit and the bird,
| named Bill by him, sings from mutiled
| dusk, tll silver-shodden dawn. BIZ 1t is
| to be noted, will turn his new family out
| of doors in a few days and drive them
| away, showing up a lille later with new
| er and pumper wife, who, In turn viii do
Such Is the tribal failing of the mocker. He
| Is a heaVen-born minstrel all right, but
| he is immoral.
Wyche who is a silent man unless set
| going upon his mania, spends much of his
| time in the fields and woods and learns
| strange things. He says that the hen hawk
| Is one of the most intelligent of the things
| of air but is hampered with an uncontrol-
| liable temper. 1t has been his practice 20
get this temper aroused and thereby lead
| the hawks TO their destruction. The result
| is that he has killed more hawks than any
| man in Louisiana a section of the union
| wherein this bandit of the empyrean Is
| especially common. He does il in this way:
| 1t is the habit of the hawk to alight only
| on bare linbs-ihe limbs Of dead trees by
| preference--because from such coigns of
| vantage his vision is unObsrructed 10y
| leaves His eye, which is remarkably keen,
gives him wide range and he can not be
| stalked by a man with a gun. Down on
| the far edge of the field, half mile from
| the house, Wyche has erected pole near
| ly fifty feet high, and across the top of II
| he has fastened a scythe painted black
| and with the edge turned up and ground
| to a razor sharpness. The hawk that
| alights upon the scythe gets his feet cot,
| He glances down impatiently and shifts
| his position, which results In a worse cut.
The moment he feels the second sting and
| sees his own blood he becomes possessed
| of a blind fury and attacks the scythe
! with beak and talon. Flying a short dis
! taRce away he wheels and swoops upon
! 1t, only to fall torn and bleeding. So saw
| age Is his onslaught that almost always
| he is dead before he touches the ground.
| Not inlrequently his lower mandble is
| severed and sometimes his head is struck
| clear off from his shoulders. often the
| bodies of a half dozen hawks the beautiful
| feathers drenched in blood hang about
| the Wyche place, a warning to the tribe.
,fr.l 70 t.a ssfp IL
| about the only person in BOssier parish
| not troubled by moles in his garden He
! catches them as soon as they make their
| appearance and puts an end to them. The
| moles of this section are large dark gray
| animals, blind as a bat, of course, and
| speedy underground. The amount of dirt
they will get through In the course OF
half hour IS surprising. Running along
| under early cabbages or peas, they are
| capable of doing much damage in a night
or day. Being blind they work at all
| hours. 1t is difficult to catch them in an
| ordinary way, because when a mole hears
the stroke of a spade he dives, al 1t We're,
| and goes down grea- deal faster than
| a man can follow him His misfortune
is that il is his habit unless disturbed,
to travel near the surface, and leaves
| pronounced ridge along the gorgad, show
ing the course he has taken Wyche
wastes no time in digging for him. He
has method of his own for exterminat-
ing the pest Ascertaining by the shape
of the tell-tale ridge the direction In which
the mole is headed he sticks a cows horn
in the ground with the orifice downward
! Then he goes to the ridge and begins 10
tap upon it lightly with a switch The
mole hearing the noise, moves slowly but
| steadily forward until he comes to the
| horn, which he enters. His pursuer pulls
| 1t up, shakes him out upon the groun0,
| puts his foot on him, and ends him.
Of ba NM
Der of headless perch and bass found float
| ing in the waters near here Is a curious
one, and ne offers to demonstrate its truth
10 any one who can and will spare the
time to accompany him to any one Of the
small bodies of water with which the land
| hereabouts is dotted. lie says that the
work of decaptation is accomplished by
| the ordinary hard-shell turtle, the ChelO-
mia, which the negroes call mud turtle"
! The capture is one OF the strangest things
in nature, betraylng sagacity that no one
would look for In the unlovely body and
idiotic leer of the turtle. The darlSles give
him credit for great brain power, which is
In line with Uncle Remus glorification of
''Brer Terrapln," ana Wyche says that
he deserves every bit OF it. The hard
backed water turtle of the Louisiana bay
Gus Is not unlike dark brown mud in color.
When he is in quest of prey he renders
the deception even nearer perfection by
burying himself in the Shiny ooze of the
bottom until only his ihaadlis left project
ing. He has long and very narrow
tongue, which he IS able to eject from
his mouth to a distance OF an inch or an
inch and half beyond his lips. He sticks
out his tongue and lays low" Waving
| gently backward and forward in the water,
the tongue looks like nothing in the world
so much as an angleworm out of its ele-
ment. The perch nibbles at 1t and tho
bass dashes at H. In either case, the
iron Jaws close with lightning snap and
there Is a dead fish around Sometimes
the turtle pursues the drifting carcass and
makes a meal OF 1t. Sometimes he con-
tents himself with the head, which is al
| ways severed from the body just back OF
the gills Fish brains are loved by the
turtle, and if he is not especially hungry
he regales himself upon this morsel,
climbs upon a log, and goes 10 sleep with
100 degrees Fahrenheit of sun porting upon
i his armored back. 500 ta ps I'D -
The Suns naturalist who lives at Ches-
| ter, N. Y, said the other day that wood
cock caught worms by boring ihofes In