Woodcock hunters claim that this speed is so great that the bird is invisible till he reaches a height of four or five feet. I am inclined to believe them for I have never yet seen a flushed bird till he got shoulder high, though he may have come up right in front of my nose. So vigorous are the strokes of his wings during this flight that the stiff wing feathers make a shrill whistling which is peculiar to the bird. Rapidity of flight seems to be in the main exhausted by this effort, however, for after they get fairly launched they seem to go rather slowly and clumsily. In the case of the woodcock, as in that of the partridge, the rainless spring and early summer seem to have given the birds a chance to bring their full complement of young through to maturity.
So, looking over the result of harvest and round-up in pasture and woodland, I can see no reason why Nature should shed many tears or go into any tantrums over the results of her busy season. These seem to me to be above the average, and I look forward to a bright and sunny November, during which she will count up the finished product with all good cheer.
The tally of young brought to successful maturity is all that the animal world has to show for the success of its department during the season of growth. But nuts and fruit and ripe seeds are only part of the work of the trees and shrubs. All the time that they are busy producing that two feet or less of woody growth, all the time the growing and ripening of seeds is going on, there is a further and very important labor to be attended to. That is the production of next year’s buds. This is no haphazard matter, nor is it left until the other things are out of the way, but is carefully begun and patiently carried on through the summer, early autumn seeing everything complete.
The falling of leaves and ripe fruit shows these hopes for future foliage and flower revealed for the first time. Stand on a knoll in the pasture and look over the tops of shrubs and trees on these keen and clear November days and you will see that the most beautiful colors of the year are there waiting your eye after you thought that all color had flamed to its climax and died in the dead ashes of autumn memories. Grays that are incredibly soft and coot in the vigorous young limbs of the maples warm into tender reds on the twig tips where the next year’s buds sit snug.