Part 4

On returning I found that two of the little birds had died. I determined to try hard to save the remaining one. It was impossible to get whiskey because I live in a temperance town. I gave the little bird a weak solution of baking soda because he had a big lump in his craw. Then I wrapped him in a silken scarf, and warmed him beside the cook stove as I have seen baby chicks revived when they have been chilled by a sudden rain. The lump disappeared. He brightened up. I could find no grubs; but a few grasshoppers, some ant larvæ, and several juicy green cabbage worms were food enough for the rest of that day. I kept the bird in his wrappings all day, but fixed it so he could clamber on to the basket. At night I put him away warm and snug, and seemingly happy. The first sound I heard the next morning was “Gitse gitse.”

The little bird was ready for a meal. From an ant hill near by I got more ant larvæ, something which all young birds like. For the first time now he swallowed food just as soon as it got inside his bill. Up to this time he had jerked it out unless it was poked down. But he still refused to open his bill.

He did not care for the nest and never would stay on it. So I fixed him again in the little basket where he would be more snug. I had lined it with cotton batting and woolen cloth so his breast would be against a soft, warm surface. I also kept him at an even temperature, and fed him regularly. The little basket was on my work table. He seemed to enjoy being near me and being talked to. Sometimes he flew over on my shoulder. I fed him more cabbage worms and grasshoppers, and also gave him water occasionally.

I could not forgive myself to think I hadn’t asked for advice sooner. I felt sure that, had I done so the first day I took charge of these birds, and then followed instructions, the two would not have died.

Again at the close of the day Baby Swift was put away in his warm wrappings. In the morning I did not hear the usual, “Gitse gitse.” Baby Swift had gone to the bird heaven.

It had been a big undertaking to adopt those homeless birds; but I am glad for several reasons that I did it.

_First_, I am glad that I helped them in their trouble.

_Second_, I am glad I relieved the boy and his busy mother of caring for them.

_Third_, I am glad because I have since read in the bird books that the chimney swift is a very useful bird; that he feeds wholly on troublesome insects.

_Fourth_, I am glad because it gave me opportunity to get acquainted with one more bird. I consider that something worth while.

VIII BIRDS NOT OF A FEATHER

One day, on looking up into a tree in the vacant lot, what should I see there? A mother robin just dropping a worm into her baby’s open beak.

The nest was right in the crotch where the trunk forks into two main branches. So many robins’ nests are blown off the branches by the wind, or washed off by heavy rains, that I was glad to see this nest firmly saddled on that strong trunk. But a second thought told me that it was easy for cats and squirrels to get at, so I studied how to make it safe.

All the tin sheeting had been used up; but I knew where there was some old stove pipe. A kind neighbor ripped it open. One piece was not wide enough to go around the tree, so I had to use two. Mrs. Cotton, who had again become my neighbor, having built a bungalow on one of the vacant lots, came to help me. She said it wasn’t good for the tree to drive nails into it, and fetched some wire. Meanwhile, I got the stepladder; for the sheeting must be high enough so that cats and squirrels cannot jump from the ground to the trunk above it. We used only two small nails, to keep the wires from slipping.

Of course, the robins scolded while we were doing this. They never liked to have anybody near their tree.

After a week the young ones were sitting on the edge of the nest. I knew then that they would soon leave it, and I began to keep a close watch on them, and on the cats of the neighborhood.

If all cats belonged to people, and had to be kept on their own premises, little birds would be much safer. As it is, cats may roam wherever they please. They can crouch in tall grasses, flower beds, shrubs, and other places, ready to pounce on any bird that comes near enough. Homeless cats who have to hunt their living are the greatest menace to birds, especially to young birds who are not yet wise to the dangers that surround them. Now who is to blame? Surely not the cats. Instead of continually berating the cats, let the friends of birds secure laws to license cats, to compel people to keep their cats on their own premises, to punish people for putting cats astray, and to put homeless cats out of their misery.

One June day, while walking along the ravine, I saw three robins on the ground. I went to the tree to see if the young had all left the nest, and found that one was still there. He looked down, as if he would like to go to join his brothers; but he seemed to be afraid to leave the safe little home. The parents brought food to him and also to those on the ground. Whenever the parents went to the one on the nest, they urged him to come over to some of the near branches; but he stayed on the nest as if glued to it. Finally, one of the parents got behind him and just politely pushed him off. He spread his wings to fly, but fluttered to the ground. Instead of continuing my walk that morning I stayed with the robins. About a hundred feet away I could see them well with my field glasses. My neighbor, Mrs. Cotton, was just as much interested in these birds as I was. They could not fly well yet. Between us we saw to it that no harm befell them that day.

Towards evening the robins also sought the protection of those bristly thornapple bushes. One by one they coaxed the young in that direction.

During that night a great storm came up of lightning and thunder and rain. I was sorry for the young robins, but had no doubt that their parents shielded them. I have seen a mother bird sit faithfully on the nest when the rain was pelting her mercilessly. Mother love knows no discomforts.

I think all birds enjoy a good shower; they always sing joyously as soon as it clears again, and sometimes while it is still raining. Some also enjoy a shower bath. Sometimes they finish it with a ducking in the basin. Those that do not care for the shower usually know where to find a comfortable place during a heavy downpour. On such occasions, I have seen them take refuge in trees, close to the trunk where it is steady and where the foliage is dense over them. And I have seen them go for shelter under rail fences, such as there are in the country, where the rails are broad enough to protect a little bird. I have also seen birds come out from under a corn-crib after a rain, so I presume they had gone under it for shelter.

After the robins had left their nest I took the sheeting off the tree. It is said that the bark of a tree is its lungs through which it breathes. I want all the trees around me to breathe deeply of the precious air, so I try always to save the bark. It is much easier to take off the wires than it is to take nails out of a tree. Already some insects had made nests and cocoons under this sheeting.

My way of getting acquainted with birds was by keeping a notebook. In it I wrote everything I saw any bird do: what he ate, how he sang, what he looked like, where he was generally seen, etc. I always watched a bird as long as it stayed in sight. When it left I observed its flight and its shape. Then I looked at the colored pictures in my bird books, to see if I could find a bird similar to mine. If I did find him, then I read all about him to see whether that bird ate the kind of food, and acted, and flew, and sang, in the way my strange bird did. If he did, then I knew I had made the acquaintance of a new bird.

For instance, I had written about one bird:

“Rather plump, head pointed, bill long. Head and back olive. Front yellow. Wings dark with white bars. Tail brown with dark marks. Is on the fence getting strings. Also visits the basin. Never sings. Likes bread crumbs. Nearly as large as robin.”

Sometimes there came with this bird a beautiful black and orange bird. In a little pocket guide I found both these birds pictured as mates. They were the Baltimore orioles. She was the bird I had described in my notebook. While she was getting strings, her mate was usually up in a tree somewhere near, singing:

“Hee_\ho/hee, hee_\ho ho/hee.”

It was no wonder that the orioles needed so many strings. They made a baglike nest on the tip end of a branch in Mrs. Cotton’s elm. The wind used to swing that nest like a hammock. I often thought how nice it must be for those baby orioles to be rocked by the wind and to have such a fine musician for their father.

Mrs. Cotton was keeping her cat housed during those days. Moreover, she threw bread out on her lawn every day for any birds that might want it. The orioles were among the birds that went there; they preferred graham or entire wheat bread to white bread.

Other birds that came to my yard were the brown thrasher, the goldfinch, and the redheaded woodpecker. They had their nests along the ravine.

The redheaded woodpeckers’ home was in a hole of an old tree near the ravine. Their call was a guttural “Chr-r-r,” which was pleasant to hear. Near the nest tree was a big stone which they used as a convenient perch. The woodpecker babies did not have the showy red head and neck of the parents; theirs were of a rusty color, and the white on their wings was barred with black. During the summer, Father Woodpecker often brought the babies to the food station. They could help themselves pretty well to suet; but the peanuts were a puzzle to them. They just pecked into the shell and tried to eat that. Usually, before the babies arrived, the father came and perched on some high point and looked all around. If all was to his liking, he sounded his rattling tattoo. The babies always came so promptly that it was evident he had hidden them somewhere near, probably with orders to await his signal before venturing farther.

I think the brown thrasher must have had a large family; he used to tear off pieces of bread and carry them away from the bird table. Once he carried off a piece of cheese that kept him trailing near the ground, it was so heavy. A blackbird followed and tried to take it, but the thrasher got away from him.

A queer thing about the brown thrasher is his song. It is made up of real words and sentences, and he sings everything twice or more times. If you should ever hear a big brown bird, with a long reddish tail and speckled breast, sing, “Beverly Beverly,” “Peter Peter,” “Tell it to me! Tell it to me!” “Come here! Come here!” and such things, then you have heard the brown thrasher. If you will look high enough you can almost surely see him too, in the top of a high tree. He loves to be seen as well as heard.

Mrs. Brown Thrasher looked just like her mate. She had hidden her nest so well that I did not find it until it was empty. It was in a dense thicket. I knew it was hers because she was still near. “Io-it! io-it!” she scolded, until I went away. One little baby thrasher was on a branch of the thicket. The mother was guarding him.

The goldfinches were very late with their housekeeping. In July they were still gathering strings and cotton for their nesting. They are just as polite and gentle as the chickadees. Their name fits so well that anybody who sees these yellow birds, just like canaries with black wings and tail, ought to know them at once. Their song usually starts with “Sweet sweet sweet,” and the rest is a regular canary song. They are sometimes called wild canaries.

The young goldfinches loved to sit on the edge of their nest as soon as they were old enough. As they sat there they chattered to each other, “Ze bebe, ze bebe,” and fluttered their wings a great deal. When I found their nest I was surprised that I hadn’t seen it before; it was low on a buckeye.

When the young goldfinches left their nest it seemed as if they wanted to get acquainted with people. They came down on the lowest branches, and quite near the house. One alighted on the clothesline. Whenever Father or Mother came with food there was the greatest fluttering of wings. Each one called, “Ze bebe ze bebe,” as loud as he could, and opened wide his bill to catch what the parents tossed or squirted out to him. It was no living, squirming thing, but a pulpy mass.

The young were yellow in front, olive on the back, and they had black wings with brown and white bars. The black tail was edged with white.

Goldfinches like sunflower seeds. But the main reason why they are so useful and so well liked is that they eat large quantities of thistle seeds and dandelion seeds.

When cold weather came the parent goldfinches were no longer so beautifully yellow, for they had put on their gray autumn coats.

IX THE MARTINS’ AIRCASTLE

The purple martins like a house with many rooms, so they can live together in a large company. Since the martins belong to the swallow family, to call them purple swallows would, it seems to me, be more informing.

My friend who had sent me the wren apartment house was so pleased with its success that he sent me also a martin house. It is four stories high and has twenty-six rooms. Around each story are porches, some of them several inches wide.

It pleases birds to have their houses look, before they occupy them, as if they had been out in all sorts of weather. So, for several weeks before this martin house was set up, it lay out in the yard to be rained and snowed on.

One cold March day a purple bird came in at my window. He perched on picture frames, twittered a little, and went out again. According to the bird books, my little visitor was a purple martin. Maybe he had seen the martin house on the lawn, and came to ask me to put it up. Anyway, the next day it was mounted in the farthest corner of the garden. For, according to the directions that came with the house, martins want their houses to be fifty feet away from any building or tree, and on a pole at least sixteen feet high.

In early April another martin came; or maybe it was the same one, returning to see whether the house had been put up. Martins always send one of their number ahead to look up a house for them. He is called a scout. This martin scout perched on the wires nearby, and tried repeatedly to alight on one of the porches of the martin house. But some English sparrows were there; they also wanted that house. Every time the scout went near, these sparrows flew at him and kept him from getting a foothold on the house. Sometimes he managed to perch on the roof and there wait for a chance to get inside. But the sparrows were too many for him. Now and then he gave a sad note, as if he were discouraged and calling for help. Then again it seemed as if something had encouraged him, and he sang out clearly something like this:

“Whew whew whew _tr-r-r-r _cho cho cho cho.”

After holding out against the sparrows for three days, he went away. About a week later I heard a sweet and happy twitter. Several martins were flying around the house. I had named it The Martins’ Aircastle. By this time the English sparrows had begun nesting in some of the rooms.

The martins perched on the wires in front of the house and made a saucy chatter, calling the sparrows all sorts of names, I suppose. The sparrows jabbered back at them. In about an hour the martins left.

Early the next morning another flock of martins came. Some perched on the wires, some on the roof, and some on the porches of the martin house. Others flew around in big circles. All were twittering and calling in their happiest manner.

I had driven the sparrows away the night before, and this is how I did it: I put a few big nails into a tin can, then closed the can and tied it to a long stick. With this stick I banged the can against the martin house pole again and again. It frightened the sleeping sparrows. By the moonlight I could see six come out and fly away; but I think there were more.

Two pairs of sparrows came back in the morning. They had made their nests side by side in the third story. Long grasses were hanging out from the entrances. Perhaps the martins were sorry for them; anyway, it looked as if they were willing to play fair. They did not chase them off any more; and the sparrows, being now so few, no longer molested the martins.

The martins now began to clean house. There were wads of chicken feathers and some broken eggs among the rubbish which they threw out. This was soon replaced by straws and sticks which they brought for their own nesting. I could only count twelve pairs of martins, so that there were plenty of rooms for them and the sparrows too. I suppose one reason why the sparrows were unwelcome is because they are such untidy housekeepers as to render close neighboring with them insanitary.

The more I see of martins, the better I like them. They are always cheerful, always busy. Their shiny, purple plumage, broad shoulders, and tapering body give them a distinguished air. These purple birds are the father martins. The mother martins’ back feathers, when exposed to the sunlight, have all the shades of violet. In front they are cream-colored, and finely speckled.

These violet-colored ones stayed around home more than the others; this is why I took them to be the mothers. The father martins flew around and brought in the provisions, which they caught on the wing. On returning a martin would sometimes sit on the porch and sing into the room to his mate; or she would come out to him, and the two would coo to each other in the most affectionate manner.

The martins were also friendly with all their bird neighbors. But they were so high up that their housekeeping was for the most part a secret which they wanted to keep to themselves. It was hard to tell what they had to eat, except when one caught a dragonfly or a grasshopper. When one got a big catch like that, he usually held it squirming in his bill a while as if he was proud of it and wanted to show it off. Or maybe he tried in this way to prolong the enjoyment of it. When it began to disappear in his bill the body always went first and the wings last.

Martins are not strong on their feet. Even when walking around on the porches of their house they just waddled, like ducks. But at flying they are masters. They can soar high, almost out of sight, then shoot straight down and skim along close to the ground.

Sometimes the martins visited the basin to get a drink or to bathe. One of their favorite pastimes was to roll in the sand in our garden. When around home they loved to perch on the wires or lounge on the porches. They also visited a bald tree not far off, and there preened themselves. I never saw them visit trees that had foliage on them.

Some more English sparrows tried from time to time to come back. It seemed as if they watched for the martins to go away. Then they would come and peer into the rooms, and even go in. The martins, however, always left one of their number on guard, for usually the intruders were soon chased away.

Once a martin caught an English sparrow in his room. He went in, but kept one wing outside, and that wing flapped and fluttered just like a flag in a high wind. No doubt the sparrow got a good beating with the other wing. Sounds of “Kr-r-r! kr-r-r!” came from the room. “Kr-r-r!” is the scolding word of the martins. It sounds as if someone, walking beside a picket fence, were scraping it with a stick. I have often heard the martins say it to the sparrows, but never have I heard them use it among themselves. They are the most contented birds, always polite and kind to one another. For good behavior I have put them on the honor roll with the chickadees and the goldfinches.

The martins are also wonderful singers and whistlers. They sing all day long, and often after dark. Their song is made up of three parts: a sibilant or smacking twitter, a trill, and a whistle. To me it sounds something like this:

“Hee_\chut-chut-chut/^tr-r-r-r\_ho/^hee\ho-ho-ho.”

They keep this up in a sort of conversational fashion, and as they do so are continually changing places on the housetop, the porches, or the wires.

In June the baby martins began to lounge on the porches and to sun themselves on the wires. After a while there were more babies. The porches were covered with them. My! how busy those parents were! As babies increased in numbers, evidently the parents felt that the older ones ought to become self-supporting; but they preferred to spend their days preening and twittering and being waited on. The parents pecked and scolded them, and finally pushed them off their perches to make them go and hunt food for themselves.

One day after the second batch of babies had appeared outside, two hawks came and perched on the telephone wires near the martin home. My attention was attracted to them by the guttural calls or scoldings of the martins. As they called, they flew swiftly to and from the house, and around in big circles. Soon the wires were lined with martins that had come from other colonies, and the air was rent with their guttural shriekings. Evidently they felt that these big birds were a great menace to their young. To the credit of the English sparrows it must be said that they also flew around with the martins, and tried to help them call attention to the danger. The hawks stayed about fifteen minutes, looking constantly in all directions; for they were completely surrounded by the vigilant and frantic martins all that time. Then they flew into a bald tree near by, and after looking on from there a while they flew away. They returned a few times after that, but never again stayed long enough to cause such a commotion.

After the young were all able to fly, the whole company was usually away most of the day. Early in the morning when they were getting ready to go, and at sunset time when they returned, there was always a great demonstration, with trilling, and twittering, and whistling, about the house and on the wires. The home-coming of the martins was a daily event to which not only we, but our neighbors also, looked forward.

Then, as night set in, there was a steady chorus of cooing as if each martin mother were singing a lullaby to her numerous babies. We used to wonder how they all existed in those rooms, six inches square by six inches high. For no matter how hot the night, they all went inside before midnight.

One evening my former neighbor, Mrs. Daily, was present when the martins returned. She also had put up a martin house, but so far it had not been occupied.

“Your house has such wide porches, and mine hasn’t any,” she remarked, as she watched the returning birds sit on the porches and coo to each other. “And,” she added, “I have been told that my house is too near the garage.”

It is true that martins are not easily attracted; but when once they have accepted a house they will be steady summer tenants for years. When I think what a pleasure it is to have a flock of these lovely birds, year after year, from April to September, I wonder that any good-sized yard is without a martin house. Martins are content to live anywhere, in town or country. All they want is the right kind of a house with plenty of room around it, and they like some wires near by for perches.