. [Articles about birds from National geographic magazine]. Birds. 126 THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE. FIERCE AND ALERT, THIS YOUNG GREAT HORNED OWL SCARED THE AUTHORS DOG "She had just left the nest, near Great Falls, Virginia, but was too weak to fly far. We chased her until she perched on a small limb, which she was unable to grip tightly enough to keep upright, and caught her while she was hanging upside down. Placed on the ground, she fluffed out her feathers, snapped her beak, and glared at us with bright yellow eyes. Our dog was sufficiently impressed to do his barking from a saf
. [Articles about birds from National geographic magazine]. Birds. 126 THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE. FIERCE AND ALERT, THIS YOUNG GREAT HORNED OWL SCARED THE AUTHORS DOG "She had just left the nest, near Great Falls, Virginia, but was too weak to fly far. We chased her until she perched on a small limb, which she was unable to grip tightly enough to keep upright, and caught her while she was hanging upside down. Placed on the ground, she fluffed out her feathers, snapped her beak, and glared at us with bright yellow eyes. Our dog was sufficiently impressed to do his barking from a safe ; lose all fear in the thrill of the climb. After tying our ropes to a stout tree and getting our camera equipment in readiness for the descent, we argued as to who would go first. As we all wanted the honor of the first climb and the thrill of finding the eyrie, we flipped a coin. I (John) won the flip and went over first (page 111). Once over the cliff I could not hear a word from above. Morgan Berthrong went over to the far end of the crag, where he could hear my voice, and relayed my in- structions to tighten or slacken the rope. We had overlooked the fact that the cliff was overhung. When dangling on the end of a hundred feet of rope, with the ground two hundred feet below, I found myself ten feet to the left of the nest and fifteen feet away from the cliff. As I hung there in space I wondered if I had not been hasty in taking first chance. Frank and Morgan were afraid to at- tempt swinging me for fear of loosening rocks, and they had about decided to haul me up when I solved the problem myself by taking a deep breath, shoving off a projecting rock, and swinging in a large semicircle which landed my body squarely on the nesting ledge but left my stomach falling in space. Like the parent birds, I had flown to the nest. The nesting cavity was so small that it barely contained the four half-grown hawks. There was no place to stand, so I signaled and was quickl
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