Norwich bulletin. [volume] (Norwich, Conn.) 1895-2011, 1909-09-25

september otn Cyril faine Drought
me a Carolina rail, picked up under
telephone wires at the Neighborhood-
/ also picked up sora at West Mys-
tic with the same deadly mark
on its neck. Mrs. Murdock's cat killed
another rail from the ten young hatch
ed in William Browns meadow. These
are my only English Neighborhood
records, though I have heard the sora's
sharp call in July in our own cat
tail reeds. A female was covering
from ten to fourteen eggs on Groton
Long Point for five years in succession
and I saw some of the tiny young
taken down by tho big Lower Field
frogs. Several times hslf-fledged rail
were seen in the Marx meadow west
of the Wildcat rocks, East Norwich.
/ could always ind two or three pairs
breeding at Poquetanuck cove. and
from above the road at the cove l
took a well-matted nest for the late
Capt. Charles Bendire.
The captain wished me to get for
him a series of nests of the local RAJ
pacious birds, and at one time l had
by heroic efforts secured for him typ
ical nests Of red-taiied, red shoulder
ed. Cooper's, rp-shinned. marsh,
and broad-winged hawks-the broad
wings being the smallest in the bulky
lot. The great horned owls. nest had
been used by redtails, and the barred
owls built by red shouldered hawks.
With the aid of Capt. Thomas Potter
and his lobster boat / made a siren
uous attempt to tie up and transport
a fish hawks nest from Sea Flower
beacon. 1t was a monstrous. affair,
used for generation, and in its COM
position had bushels of cornstalks and
lobster war; yards of cables, dead
crows horseshoe crabs, deer's feet, and
bushels of seaveed and hanging usnea
moss. The untimely death of Captain
Bendire left these large nests uncalled
for, and slowly falling to pieces in
the cellar of 1913 Broadway. they were
finally consigned to the fre magazine
of the steam heater.
In the East Woodstock list we did
not see the white winged crossbill,
which I never failed to find in open
winter days in our own hemlock woods.
An East Woodstock man early last
cuted American crossbill in red
nuptiaI dress. have had two
woodcock killed by Woodstock
wires, and nearly twenty mangled by
phone and telegraph wires along the
seventeen miles of the Colchester
turnpike. These birds when fresh
have had served at my table, thus eat
ing game out of season without break
ing the intent or letter of the close
game laws.
ready around the few spring holes not
dried up, an occasional bird in the en-
silage patches, but not any in the
birches. No young bob whites have
been seen here, and we think the
early whistling cock quails could find
no mates and went into other towns.
Pheasants do not increase locally, and
Woodstock hunters agree with Nor
witch gunners that the young do not
survive the terrors of winter. But the
grouse chicks, in moderate numbers.
with crops gorged with late huckleber-
ries, acorns, eyebright and white grubs,
are large as the old 'biddies' and ready
for the onslaught of the licensed mob.
j have on the dryblock a fine, female
great horned owl. shot by Mr.. George
Snow after 1t was betrayed by noisy
Fostering crows. One of the local
males among our stuffed owls was shot
on a barn by Mr.. William Gordon.
chioroformGd the last cannibal buho In
the owlery. I often feel like feeding
chloroform to our rnacaw for its I'M
earthly shrieks, but for the fact that
1t initiates exactly the boots of all owls,
and the calls of bobwhite whippoor-
Will, BOullIN, QDSS anu llC nuliletAl
voice. For eight years there has been
no record of eagles at the Quail Trap.
Ospreys raSs over sometimes, and one
was shot by a farmer on Redhead Hill.
Who can tell whether it is blight
or the drought that has early in Sep
TENDER killed the leaves on all the
white birches in the four parishes.
Maybe it is a new insect plague, for
Mr.. Murdoch, who was cutting birches
today on Harold Hibbard's farm, says
that his clothes were covered with
strange looking bugs. Who ever saw
the woodbine as bright as 1t Is now
without the action of frost? Sumac,
maple and beech are foils, but the
sandf1re of the salt marshes alone can
rival it's glistening cardinal. From the
army of warbIers beginning to go
south few daily stop on the ash
nd-break at the west windows of
the Quail Trap, where sit with PEN
Gil and notebook. recording this early
movement. II the East Woodstock
bird man is similarly occupied, we can
compare notes at the end of October.
Bird matters at the west parish con-
tinue to be well looked after by the
veteran ornithologist, the Rev. Mr..
Jones, and there are a score of trained
observers between Woodstock and
Norwich. But how many of these peo-
pie could have the patience of the