| OCR Text |
Show Government Scientists Record Speed of Bird Flight The swiftest birdflight ever recorded re-corded accurately is in the neighborhood neigh-borhood of 175 miles an hour. Ordinary, Ordi-nary, unhurried flight averages from 20 to 40 miles an hour, according to the species. The United States Department of Agriculture has compiled a complete com-plete record of the measured flight speeds of North American and European Eu-ropean birds. The swiftest denizen of the skies, according to this compendium, com-pendium, is the California duck hawk whose speed, measured with a stop watch from an airplane, was found to be between 175 and ISO miles an hour. The eagle is relatively rela-tively slow. The Department of Agriculture Agri-culture compiler, found one rather questionable recorded speed of 120 miles for a golden eagle. Only two entirely trustworthy records of eagle speeds were found one of 30 and the other of 60 miles. Bird speed records more than 20 years old are worthless, the report explains, because any possible eans of measurement was quite in-ac:ir3te in-ac:ir3te and some fantastic esti-mas esti-mas Were made, managing up to 5 or miles a minute. Most such guesse and by far the most trustworthy, trust-worthy, were made by hunters. A hunter, aiming at a bird in flight. had to make three subconscious estimates esti-mates the distance of his target, the speed at which it was moving in order that he would know how far ahead to aim and the speed of his bullet. The skilled marksman learned to make allowance for these three factors instinctively, but never could explain satisfactorily how he ; did it. Only one of these elements of marksmanship, the velocity of the ! bullet, could be measured ac- i curatcly. j But, says the report, "it has been found recently by experiment that there is an appreciable loss of time in pulling the trigger. Against the sky it is practically impossible to . gauge the exact distance of the bird, and the distance it travels may be exaggerated because momentum will carry a shot bird some distance before it fa'Js. An overestimate of a very few iet in these figures will result in the computation of very h:gh speeds for game birds. Gunners Gun-ners have been prone to attribute speeds of 100 or even 150 rr.iii an hour to ducks." |
