Page:Bird-lore Vol 05.djvu/59

 44 Bird - Lore

The next day the horse rustler reported that he had taken the horses over the granite ridge again, and that this time the brooding bird had let him pass within two feet of her without risingt If she were getting as stoical as that she ought to sit well for her picture; so‘ taking the cam— era, we started for the granite knob. A strange nesting site it surely would have been for any other bird, but it was perfectly characteristic fo :1 Nighthawk‘s choice,— bare and open under the heavens.

This time the old bird was sitting, with her two young beside her, at the font of a piece of gray granite in a ring of stones, which they matched perfectly‘ their plumage reproducing both the black specking

THE OLD NIGHTHAH'K

Photographed from mum. [From the Biological Snncy)

and the brown weathering of the granite. It was hard to see the birds even without concealing vegetation. tor, besides the disguise of their color- ing. they sat on the gravel close to the rocks and against a couple of the long cones of Firm: monricala. They crouched so close and shut their eyes so tight that they suggested horned toads with wide. ﬂat bodies and slits for eyes

A number of snap-shots were made of the three birds at ten and then at seven feet without disnrbing them. and when the mother had ﬂown other photographs were taken of the young alone. To get a better View, I took up one of the little fellows. and he sat quietly in my hand till his picture was taken. when he and his brother woke up to their alarming situation and ran off in opposite directions,