The eleven nests which my guide had seen on a previous occasion were found occupying their former positions, at least one hundred feet from the ground in dead trees, one of which held five of the eleven. During the many years which the birds have nested in the place their number has not varied, and one wonders what becomes of the from thirty to forty young who doubtless each year leave the parental trees. No other Herons of this species are known to nest in the vicinity, and it is not probable that the progeny of each year would seek a nesting site in some far distant rookery; consequently, as an alternative explanation, we can only suppose that the yearly product of the rookery balances its losses by death.
The young birds were now nearly half grown, but, unlike the Night Herons, they did not venture outside their nests, from which they uttered harsh croaks in evident supplication to their parents for food. The sight of the trees in which the nests were placed effectually controlled whatever ambitions I had entertained toward camera studies at short range, and I contented myself by making telephotos from the ground, in one of which an adult bird and two nests, each with a young bird appearing above its edge, may be seen.[44]
Time was lacking in which to observe these birds, and the value of my visit to their retreat is not to be expressed in words. The wildness of their home seemed in perfect accord with their nature, and their apparent safety from intrusion brought a sense of satisfaction which colors my memory of the whole experience.
44. Looking upward from ground to nests and young and adult bird of Great Blue Heron at a height of over one hundred feet. Telephoto.
WHERE SWALLOWS ROOST
Contributing little to the material wealth of the nation, the Hackensack marshes of northern New Jersey are usually regarded as “waste land.” By the farmer they are termed “salt medders,” and their waving grasses are of value to him only as “bedding” for cattle. In winter the muskrat hunter reaps a harvest of pelts there. The down of the “cat-tails” is gathered for cushion stuffing, and the bladed leaves for chair bottoms. To the gunner they are the resort of Ducks, Snipe, Rail, and Reedbirds, which each year visit them in decreasing numbers; while to the thousands who daily pass them on the encircling railroads they are barren and uninteresting. But if beauty is a sufficient cause for being, then these marshes may claim a right to existence.
In preglacial times this region was probably forested, but now the forest is buried beneath the drift of the glacier which deposited fragments of Palisade and Orange Mountain trap rock on Staten Island. During the depression of the land which occurred as the ice gradually receded, the waters of the sea doubtless passed up here and the meadow was a larger “Newark Bay.” Then commenced their slow filling up by the silt brought down by the Hackensack River. The river has preserved a right of way, but the bay has given place to a sea of reeds and grasses.
