Part 3

The father stayed away an hour or more, and before he came back that young woodpecker had learned to help himself very well; though the minute his father came, he began to flutter his wings and beg to be fed, as if he were half starved.

A lady, who fed the wild birds on her window sill for many years, and watched their ways, says she often saw the old birds teaching their little ones. They showed them where the food was to be found, and, she says, regularly taught them the art of eating.

Then she saw them taught to be afraid of people, not to come too near her. And once she saw an old bird showing a young one how to gather twigs for nest-building. The young one looked on a while, and then tried hard to do it himself, but could not get off a single twig.

Best of all, the same lady heard an old robin giving a music lesson. The teacher would sing a few notes and then stop, while the pupil tried to copy them. He had a weak, babyish sort of voice, and did not succeed very well at first.

I have heard several birds at their music lessons.

X

SOME OF HIS LESSONS

IT is very easy to catch the birds teaching their little ones to exercise their wings and to fly together. You will see the young birds sitting quietly on fences or trees, when all at once the parents begin to fly around, with strange loud calls. In a minute every youngster will fly out and join them. Around and around they all go, hard as they can, till their little wings are tired, and then they come down and alight again.

Once I saw a young bird who did not go when his parents called. All the others flew around many times, and I suppose that young one thought he would not be noticed.

But mothers' eyes are sharp, and his mother saw him. So when she came back, she flew right at her naughty son, and knocked him off his perch. The next time she called, he flew with the rest. This was a crow mother.

I have seen a bluebird just out of the nest, taught to follow his father in this way. He stood on a small tree, crying for something to eat, when his father came in sight with a beakful of food. He did not feed him, but flew past him, so close that he almost touched him, and alighted on the next tree, a little beyond him.

The little bluebird saw the food, and at once flew after it, perched beside his father, and was fed. Then the old bird left him, and in a few minutes he felt hungry, and began to call again.

I kept close watch, and soon the father came and did the same thing over. He flew past the young one with an insect in plain sight in his beak, and perched on another tree still farther along in the way he wanted the little one to go.

The hungry baby followed, and was fed as before. In this way he was led to a big tree the other side of the yard, where the rest of the family were, and where they all spent the night.

An old robin wanted to teach her young one to bathe. She brought him to a dish of water kept for their use by some people who were fond of birds. The little one stood on the edge and watched his mother go in, and splash and scatter the water. He fluttered his wings, and was eager to try it for himself, but seemed afraid to plunge in.

At last the mother flew away and left him standing there, and in a moment came back with a worm in her mouth. The young robin was hungry, as young birds always are, and when he saw the worm, he began to flutter his wings, and cry for it.

But the mother jumped into the middle of the water dish, and stood there, holding the worm in his sight. The youngster wanted the worm so much that he seemed to forget his fear of the water, and hopped right in beside her. She fed him, and then began to splash about, and he liked it so well that he stayed and took a good bath.

Birds, as these stories show, teach their little ones by coaxing, and not by driving them.

An Englishman, Mr. Lloyd Morgan, once had some ducks and chickens hatched away from their mother, to see how much their parents had to teach them.

He found that these little orphans had to be taught to pick up their food, and to know what is good to eat. He had to show the young ducks how to dive, and teach all of them that water is good to drink.

To see if chickens had to be taught the hen language, he put them out by their mother when they were a few days old.

The hen was going about with her brood, all brothers and sisters of Mr. Morgan's chicks, and she was quite ready to adopt the new ones. She clucked and called to them with all her might, but they did not come. They acted as if they did not hear her. When the others ran and crept under her wings to be brooded, the strangers looked on, but did not think of going too.

They did not understand the calls or the ways of their own mother. They had not been taught.

A careful watcher will see the birds teach these things, and many others as interesting. But no one will see anything unless he is quiet, and does not frighten them.

THE BIRD GROWN UP

XI

THE BIRD'S LANGUAGE

WHEN the bird is grown up, there are many other interesting things to know about him,--one is, whether he can talk.

It is plain to those who have studied the ways of birds, that they are able to tell things to each other, and many writers have said plainly that birds have a language.

If you notice birds in cages, you will find that when two or more of a kind are in the same room, you will hear little chirps and twitters and other notes, not at all like their song. But if one is alone in a room, he hardly makes a sound except when singing.

Then see a robin out of doors. He is less afraid of us than most birds, and easiest to watch. If something comes up on him suddenly, he gives a sharp note of surprise. If a cat appears, he has another cry which every one can understand, a word of warning to all. If everything is quiet and his mate is near, he will greet her with some low, sweet notes.

When a partridge mother sees danger, she gives one call, which all her brood know, and at once run and hide. When the hen speaks to her chicks, they know well whether it means to come to her, or to run away.

Of course birds do not use our words. When it is said that the quail says "Bob White," it is meant that his call sounds like those words. To some the notes sound like "more wet." One may call it almost anything, like "all right" or "too hot."

You will read in books about birds, that a certain warbler says "Witches here," or that the white-throated sparrow says "Old Sam Peabody," and other birds say still different things. The writer means that the words remind one of the bird's notes, and so it is useful to know them, because it helps you to know the bird when you hear him.

I have many times seen birds act as if they were talking to each other. You can often see the city sparrows do so.

There is nothing in a bird's ways that we like so well as his singing. And in all the many species of birds in the world, no two sing exactly alike, so far as I can find out. You may always know a bird by his song. A robin does not sing like a thrush or a catbird. And what is more, not one of the sounds he utters is like those made by any other bird. If you know him well, whatever noise he makes, you will know at once that it is a robin.

But there is something still more curious about it. No robin sings exactly like another robin. When you come to know one bird well, you can tell his song from any other bird's. Of course, all robins sing enough alike for one to know that it is a robin song, but if you listen closely, you will see that it is really different from all others.

Persons who have kept birds in cages have noticed the same thing.

There is still another point to know. One bird does not always sing the same song. I have heard a song sparrow sing five or six different songs, standing all the time in plain sight on a fence. In the same way I have known a meadowlark to make six changes in his few notes.

Besides their own natural songs, many birds like to copy the notes of others. Our mockingbird is very fond of learning new things, and he does not always choose songs either.

He will imitate the noise of filing a saw, or the pop of a cork, as readily as the sweetest song. I have heard one sing the canary's song better than the canary himself.

Other birds can do the same. A common English sparrow picked up in the streets of a big city, hurt, and not able to fly, was put into a room with a canary.

No doubt the wild bird found his life in a cage rather dull, after having been used to the streets, and he soon began to amuse himself trying to do as the canary did, to sing. In a few weeks he learned the whole song, and he could sing it even better than his roommate, for his voice was full and rich, and not so shrill as the canary's.

Most people think that birds sing all summer. They think so because they have not taken notice. We who are very fond of bird song know it is not so.

Singing begins when the birds first come in the spring. It goes on while the nest is being built, and the mother bird is sitting. The father has little to do at that time, and so he sings. And besides, he seems to be so happy that he cannot help it.

But when little ones begin to call for food, he has to be very busy, and does not have so much time for music. Some birds stop singing as soon as they go to feeding.

But not all do so. Many go on singing till they begin to change their clothes, or to moult, as it is called. This happens in August or September, and when it begins, a bird seems to lose his voice.

One of the first to stop singing is the bobolink. He is rarely heard after June is past. The veery is another whose singing days are over early. You may hear his call in the woods, if you know it, but not a song will you hear after the middle of July.

By the time August comes in, almost every bird is silent, except for his calls or "talk." The birds to be heard then are the red-eyed vireo, who seems never to tire, and now and then the indigo-bird, or the wood pewee, and best of all, the dear little song sparrow, who keeps up his cheery songs till the very last.

Then you will know that all the birds are busy putting on their new suits for their long journey.

XII

WHAT HE EATS

WHAT the bird eats and where he gets his food are useful things for us to know. It has only lately been found out that birds are the most valuable of helpers to us.

What we cannot eat ourselves, they are happy to live on, and things that make us a great deal of trouble are their daily food.

Some of the things they are fond of are little animals, like mice and ground squirrels, that eat our crops. Others are insects which spoil our fruit and eat up our vegetables, cankerworms and cutworms, and a hundred more.

Besides these, many birds eat the seeds of certain weeds that farmers have to fight all the time.

One reason this helps us so greatly is that birds eat much more for their size than we do. A boy of six or eight years could not possibly eat a whole sheep in one day, but a young bird can easily eat more than his own weight every day.

They want more than three meals too. They need to eat very often. One catbird will take thirty grasshoppers for his breakfast, and in a few hours he will want thirty more. So he destroys a great many in a day.

Birds begin eating long before we are out of bed, and keep it up till night comes again, or as long as they can see.

You must not think the birds are greedy, as a person would be if he ate every few minutes all day. They are made to do so. It is their business to destroy insects, small animals, and weeds that trouble us so much, and the more they eat the better for us.

Let us see where they go for food. Each bird has his own place to work.

The catbird watches the fruit-trees, and all day long eats insects that are spoiling our fruit or killing the trees. When the cherries are ripe, we should not forget that he has saved the fruit from insects, and has well earned a share for himself.

If you spent days and weeks picking off insects, would you not think you had earned part of the fruit? "For every cherry he eats" (says a man who has watched him), "he has eaten at least one thousand insects."

The robin eats great numbers of cankerworms, which destroy our apples, and cutworms, which kill the corn.

The bluebird sits on the fence keeping sharp watch, and every few minutes flies down and picks up a grasshopper or a cricket, or some such grass-eating insect.

Woodpeckers hunt over the trunks and limbs of trees. They tap on the bark and listen, and if they hear a grub stir inside, they cut a hole in the bark and drag it out. The downy is fond of insects that infest our apple-trees, and he makes many holes in the trunks. But it does not hurt the trees. It is good for them, for it takes away the creatures that were eating them.

Orioles go over the fruit-trees, and pick out tiny insects under the leaves, and when they find great nests on the branches, they tear them open and kill the caterpillars that made them.

Little warblers, such as the pretty summer yellow-bird, help to keep our trees clear, doing most of their work in the tops, where we can hardly see them.

Swallows fly about in the air, catching mosquitoes and tiny flies that trouble us.

Very useful to us are the birds who feed upon dead animals, such as the turkey buzzards, who may be seen any day in our Southern States, soaring about high in the air, looking for their food.

What they eat is so very unpleasant to us that we are apt to despise the birds. But we should cherish and feel grateful to them instead. For they are doing us the greatest kindness. In many of the hot countries people could not live, if these most useful birds were killed.

Some persons think buzzards find their food by seeing it, and others are just as sure that they smell it. Perhaps they use both senses.

XIII

MORE ABOUT HIS FOOD

SOME of the big birds work all the time for us. When you see a hawk sitting very still on a dead limb, what do you suppose he is doing?

A good deal of the time he is looking on the ground for a mouse, or a ground squirrel, or a rat, or some creature that he likes to eat.

When he sees one of them move in the grass, he flies down and pounces upon it. Thus he helps the farmer greatly, for all of these little animals destroy crops.

When it grows dark, hawks stop work and go to sleep. Then the owls, who can see better in the dusk, come out of the holes where they have been half sleeping all day. They hunt the same little creatures, most of all rats and mice, which like best to run about in the night.

Perhaps you have heard that hawks and owls carry off chickens. Many people who keep chickens shoot every hawk and owl they see. But if they knew more about them they would not do so. Only two of the common hawks and one owl[1] disturb chickens. All the others kill thousands of the little animals that give the farmers so much trouble.

Owls have a curious way of eating mice. They swallow them whole, and after a while they throw up a queer-looking little ball made of the bones and fur of the mouse.

You may some time have seen a long-legged heron walking about on the seashore or in the salt marsh. Now and then he would thrust his long, sharp bill into something, and lift up his head and swallow. Or you have noticed a little sandpiper running along on the beach or the bank of a river.

The heron was probably eating frogs or fish, and the sandpiper some of the small sea creatures thrown up by the waves. If these were not taken away they would be very bad for us, and perhaps make us sick.

Not less useful to us than these birds are the whole family of finches. The goldfinch in bright yellow coat, the purple finch in red, and the sparrows in plain brown. All of these are fond of seeds as well as insects, and most of all they like the seeds of some weeds that are hard to get rid of.

The goldfinch is called the thistle-bird, because he likes best the seeds of thistles, though he eats the beggar's-ticks too.

The chipping sparrow, the little red-headed bird who comes about our doors, eats the seeds of fox-tail and crab grasses, that spoil our lawns.

The white-throated sparrow, a large and very pretty bird, eats the seeds of smartweed and ragweed. Other finches like bittersweet, sorrel, and amaranth, all of which we are glad to have them eat.

The seed-eating birds can find their food in winter, even when snow covers the ground, because the dead weeds hold on to their seeds, and the snow is not often deep enough to cover them.

Some birds gather their food in the fall, and hide it away where they can find it in winter. Blue jays collect acorns and beech-nuts, and store them in a hole in a tree, or some other safe place, to eat when food is scarce. A woodpecker who lives in the West picks holes in the bark of a tree, and puts an acorn into each one.

The oddest store I know of was made by a woodpecker. He found a long crack in a post, and stuffed it full of live grasshoppers. He did not like dead grasshoppers. He wedged them into the crack so tightly that they could not get out, and I do not know that they wanted to. When grasshoppers were scarce in the fields, he came day after day to his queer storehouse, till he had eaten every one.

One of the woodpecker family who lives in Mexico stores nuts and acorns in the stems of plants. These stems are hollow and made in joints like bamboo. The bird cuts a hole at the upper end of a joint, and stuffs it full. When he wants his nuts, he cuts a hole at the lower end of the joint and pulls them out.

I once had a tame blue jay, who was fond of saving what he could not eat, and putting it safely away. The place he seemed to think most secure was somewhere about me, and he would come slyly around me as I sat at work, and try to hide his treasure about my clothes.

When it was a dried currant or bit of bread, I did not care; but when he came on to my shoulder, and tried to tuck a dead meal worm into my hair or between my lips, or a piece of raw beef under a ruffle or in my ear, I had to decline to be used as a storehouse, much to his grief.

He liked to put away other things as well as food. Matches he seemed to think were made for him to hide. His chosen place for them was between the breadths of matting on the floor.

Once he found a parlor match, hunted up a good opening, and put it in. Then he went on, as he always did, to hammer it down so tightly that it would stay. One of the blows of his hard beak struck the lighting end of the match, and it went off with a sharp crack. The noise and the flame which burst out made the bird jump three feet, and scared him nearly out of his senses.

After that I took care to keep the matches out of the way of a bird so fond of hiding things.

FOOTNOTE:

[1] Cooper's and sharp-shinned hawks, and great horned or hoot owl.

XIV

WHERE HE SLEEPS

MOST birds sleep on their feet.

You know how a canary goes to sleep, all puffed out like a ball, with his head buried in the feathers of his shoulder. He may stick his bill over behind the top of the wing, but he never "puts his head under his wing," as you have heard.

Sometimes he stands straight up on one leg, with the other drawn up out of sight in his feathers, but more often he sits down on the perch, still resting on his feet. Most wild birds of the perching kind sleep in the same way.

It is only lately that we have begun to find out where birds sleep, because it is dark when they go to bed, and they get up before it is light enough for us to see them.

The only way to catch them in bed is to go out in the evening, and start them up after they have gone to sleep. And this is not very kind to the poor little birds. Some men who are trying to learn about the habits of birds have tried this way, and so have found out some of their sleeping-places.

One thing they have learned is that the nest is not often used for a bed, except for the mother, while she is sitting and keeping her little ones warm.

Robins and orioles, and others, creep into the thick branches of an evergreen tree, close up to the trunk. Some crawl under the edge of a haystack, others into thick vines or thorny bushes. All these are meant for hiding-places, so that beasts which prowl about at night, and like to eat birds, will not find them.

Tree sparrows like to sleep in holes in the ground like little caves. The men who found these cosy little bedrooms think they are places dug out by field mice, and other small animals, for their own use. And when they are left, the birds are glad to take them.

When the weather is cold, some birds sleep under the snow. You may think that would not be very warm, and it is not so warm as a bed in the house with plenty of blankets. But it is much warmer than a perch in a tree, with nothing but leaves to keep off the wind.

While the snow is falling, some birds find it as good as blankets for their use. Grouse, who live on the ground, dive into a snow-bank, and snuggle down quietly, while the snow falls and covers them all over, and keeps the cold wind off. Air comes through the snow, so they do not smother.

Some birds creep into a pile of brush that is covered with snow, and find under the twigs little places like tents, where the snow has been kept out by the twigs, and they sleep there, away from the wind and storm outside.

Water birds find the best sleeping-places on the water, where they float all night like tiny boats. Some of them leave one foot hanging down and paddling a little, while they sleep, to keep from being washed to the shore.

Bob-white and his family sleep in a close circle on the ground, all with their heads turned outward, so that they can see or hear an enemy, whichever way he comes.

Hawks and eagles are said to sleep standing, never sitting on the feet like a canary. Some ducks and geese do even more: they sleep standing on one foot. Woodpeckers and chimney swifts hang themselves up by their claws, using their stiff tail for a brace, as if it were a third leg.

Some birds, like the crows, sleep in great flocks. They agree upon a piece of woods, and all the crows for miles around come there every night. Sometimes thousands sleep in this one bedroom, called a crow roost. Robins do the same, after the young are big enough to fly so far.

Audubon, who has told us so much about birds, once found a hollow tree which was the sleeping-room of chimney swifts. The noise they made going out in the morning was like the roar of a great mill-wheel.

He wanted to see the birds asleep. So in the daytime, when they were away, he had a piece cut out at the foot of the tree, big enough to let him in, and then put back, so the birds would not notice anything unusual.

At night, after the swifts were abed, he took a dark lantern and went in. He turned the light upon them little by little, so as not to startle them. Then he saw the whole inside of the tree full of birds. They were hanging by their claws, side by side, as thick as they could hang. He thought there were as many as twelve thousand in that one bedroom.

XV

HIS TRAVELS

MOST of our birds take two long journeys every year, one in the fall to the south, and the other in the spring back to the north. These journeys are called "migrations."

The birds do not go all at once, but in many cases those of a kind who live near each other collect in a flock and travel together. Each species or kind has its own time to go.

It might be thought that it is because of the cold that so many birds move to a warmer climate. But it is not so; they are very well dressed to endure cold. Their feather suits are so warm that some of our smallest and weakest birds are able to stay with us, like the chickadee and the golden-crowned kinglet. It is simply because they cannot get food in winter, that they have to go.