Wild Life at Home: How to Study and Photograph It

They are excellent scavengers, and anyone desirous of having a bird's egg that cannot be blown cleaned out has nothing to do but bury it in an ant-hill for a couple of days. I have buried dead birds, the skeletons of which I required, in a small cardboard box, perforated along the sides, and a day or two afterwards there has not been a particle of flesh left. I have seen an ant carry a piece of cake twice its size, and in all probability also twice its own weight, up a steep bank side, and the patience and ingenuity the little creature displayed in surmount-ing different obstacles along its path were truly marvellous. Once upon a time, as the story-books put it, some aristocratic French exile living amongst the Surrey hills pined for a dish of edible snails. A

stock was accordingly brought over from the Continent and turned down within an enclosure, to be drawn upon when required. Some of these escaped and bred, and the illustration on page 155 represents one of their descendants photographed beside one of the common banded snails.

This is how some of the natives of Caterham Valley account for their presence; but as the Romans were very fond of edible snails, and introduced fallow deer and one or two other creatures to this country, it is possible they brought them from the Continent, or they may be, as some people claim, indigenous to our dry chalky hills. The great black slug is looked upon as a weather prophet in the Yorkshire dales, and if it is out in numbers during the evening or early in the morning, a wet day is said to be likely to follow. A curious fact about this particular species is that it is very fond of tobacco, for which it will at any time leave all other kinds of food.

To anyone who wishes to know how a spider builds his web I would recommend a walk almost any fine still night with a bull's-eye lantern, alongside a hedgerow or dry stone wall. I have watched some of the finest webs imaginable being woven, and the dexterity and rapidity with which the work is done are extraordinary. Those spreading large fly-nets across the openings between wooden palings and other places where a current of air is likely to sweep winged victims into them, have the guide-

I 5 8 WILD LIFE AT HOME.

lines fixed first, and then the circular ones worked in from the outer edges." They generally do the

SPIDER AND WEB (PHOTOGKAPHED BY FLASHLIGHT).

work from the outside, and as soon as they have completed their task retire inside and wait in the centre for their prey. As an instance of the deadly nature of some of these nets, I counted no fewer

than 185 flies in one of average size made in the corner of a doorway upon one occasion.

SPIDER AM) WKK OX A ROSE-TREE.

Of course different species build different kinds of nets and traps, and the great strength of hiany of them is surprising. Some spiders simply rush up and seize their

prey directly it becomes entangled, especially when the victim is of small size. I saw the one figured on page 158 do this with a fly, which he unceremoniously dragged right through his web and straightway devoured. Others, when they entangle a large fly, bind it securely before they commence

GRASSHOPPER.

to despatch it. I once watched a blue-bottle enmesh itself in a spider's web. The owner was waiting at the end of his tunnel of retreat, and directly the poor fly began to struggle it telegraphed the news of its predicament down along the threads of the web, and out rushed the spider in response. There was a very brief encounter, and the blue-bottle began to revolve like a spitted ox before a fire, and turn greyer and greyer. At every turn the spider

was binding it with an additional thread, and when the victim was secured beyond all possible chance of escape the captor quietly set to and drank its blood. Spiders and their webs are easy to photograph on calm days and nights, and the latter look particularly well when covered with hoar frost.

The Surrey hills swarm with grasshoppers of every size and hue. They are, as may be guessed, however, extremely difficult subjects to photograph. I succeeded in making the study on page 160, which has been enlarged, upon a much-frequented grass-bank after half a day's careful stalking and repeated attempts.

A QUIET CORNER OF MIDDLESEX.

CHAPTER VII.

BITS BY POND, RIVER, AND SEASHORE.

THIS chapter deals with three wide fields all teeming with life; and therefore only the commonest of creatures, and such as lend themselves to portrayal by means of the camera, can claim our attention within its pages. Newts, or efts as they are called in some parts of the country, are common in most ponds, and seem to be in possession of extremely shrewd notions of how to take care of themselves. I watched a couple ascend a little creek on the side of a cattle pond one day in search of something to eat, and stealing quietly up behind them barred their way out, and being an old hand at trout tickling, soon caught the pair and put them into an empty lemonade bottle which I found close by and filled with water. I stood it up in a cow's hoof-hole for a few minutes whilst I went in search of a worm or two wherewith to render my captives happy in their new quarters; but when I came back one of them had regained the pond, and the other arrived so near it that he beat me in the race and swam away before I could lay hands on him. It is amusing to sit and

watch these little creatures rise and take a fly and quickly dive to the bottom of their native pond with it. I have no doubt but that in fairly clear water a photograph could be obtained of them in the act of seizing their prey.

GOLD FISH.

More as an illustration of what may be done with a camera in this way, than for its appropriateness from a natural history point of view, 1 have had the accompanying photograph reproduced. It represents a number of gold fish swimming in a pond upon which a handful of crumbs was thrown to attract them to the surface. The picture was made from the top of a little stone bridge.

Frogs are common enough almost everywhere, and are extremely easy to study and photograph. I once kept one as a pet in a little suburban garden, and we became great friends. I used to feed him with flies and worms until he would almost take them from my hand. He used to examine my contributions to his dietary for a few seconds in a wise sort of way, and then, darting out his long tongue with the quickness of a flash of lightning, literally pitch the food down his throat. I do not believe it is generally known that a frog's tongue is differently hung to that of nearly every other living creature. It is attached to the front part of the under jaw, and when at rest points down the animal's

gullet. My tame friend was very fond of bluebottle flies, but I could never get him to tackle a wasp under

any circumstances although I tried him over and over again. Frogs cry out most pitifully when they have good reason to fear harm is coming to them. I have often known them to do this when trying to escape from the murderous swish of a mower's scythe. One morning I heard my pet give mouth, and knowing that there must be mischief in the air, rushed out to see what was the matter. A great grey cat had seized the frog, but immediately dropped him at the instigation of a flying broom. The little chap was both injured and scared, so

immediately sought shelter in a favourite bit of rockery where he usually retired in hot weather. He

recovered, but I regret to' say the cat ultimately succeeded in killing him. I have measured an adult frog's leap on level ground and found it to be twenty-three inches in length, but it is said to be capable of much more.

Frogs love a hole filled with peat-moss water better than any other kind of situation to breed in, and I have seen quite a large place of this kind literally black with tadpoles during the month of June. Here, earlier in the spring, their weird croak-ing may be heard to perfection. I have many, many times sat on a boulder, away up on a lonely Yorkshire moor, far from any human haunts or sound, and listened to an almost unbroken chorus coming from a brown slime-covered pool close by until the whole place began to feel eerie and uncanny. Some people are incapable of distinguishing frog music from that of a turtle dove. I was sitting on a roadside rail one summer's evening watching a water vole in a pond not far from Elstree, when three London cyclists rode by. One of them heard a turtle dove calling in a hedge close at hand, and called out, " Bill, ? His friend wasdo you hear that frog a-croakin' " in the act of expressing some measure of surprise when his wheels carried him out of earshot.

Toads are not nearly so common as frogs, and although somewhat similar in size and appearance, they may be easily distinguished from the latter by their warty skins, and their crawling method of

progression instead of leaping. I remember how very frightened I used to be of the poor innocent creatures when I was a boy, labouring under the belief that what some of the old country folks said about their venomous qualities was true.

A member of the species sat all last winter under a big tuft of grass in my garden. He had worked such a hole for himself in the mould that his back was on a level with the ground. An errand boy belonging to a general store discovered him one day when delivering goods, and afterwards harassed the poor thing by all sorts of unwelcome attentions until he was obliged to desert his shelter probably long before he intended to do so. I thought I had quite lost my toad until one night,

weeks after we had missed him, he walked into a room where I was sitting writing and came quite sedately up on to a hearthrug close to my feet.

Trout have many interesting little habits that even the man who tries to deceive them with an artificial fly does not know much about. Those living in shallow, rapid streams come right out to the very edges in search of larvse during summer nights, and as the light from a bull's-eye lantern fills them with a kind of staring curiosity they can be photographed by the aid of a flash-lamp. I have often seen them searching for food in water so shallow that their backs were not covered. Owls and cats occasionally profit by a discovery of this nocturnal boldness. In the autumn trout begin to ascend rivers and brooks in order to get to their breeding quarters in small sluggish streams with sandy bottoms if possible, and upon their journey encounter such obstacles as weirs and waterfalls, which they may be seen leaping almost every minute for days together, thus affording an opportunity for any enterprising camera man. Artificial light exercises almost as great a fascination over trout as it does over moths. I have, when helping experimentalists in pisciculture, put a small hand net down in the bottom of little streams which I could easily stride across anywhere, and then attracted such a crowd of wondering fish over it with the rays from a bull's-eye that I caught three or four at a time by