Part 9

The mockingbird is one of our most knowing birds, and when one is tamed and free in a house, he is very amusing. He is as full of fun as a catbird, and as funny to watch. A true story was told in one of the papers, of a captive who had some queer tricks. One was hunting in a workbox for a paper of needles, taking it down to the floor, and working it open, then suddenly giving it a jerk that sent the needles in a shower all over the floor.

This bird was once shut up in a room alone, while the family were at table. He did not like it, for he wanted to be with them; so he amused himself unwinding all the spools of thread in the workbox. He took one end of the thread and carried it all about the room, around everything and over everything--vases on the shelf, pictures on the wall, chair-legs, sofas, and lamps. Everything in the room was tied together, so that no one could go in lest something should be thrown down. The naughty bird was delighted with his mischief. He sat there singing at the top of his voice. The only way the family could get into the room was to get scissors and cut their way in. They found empty spools all over the floor, and hundreds of yards of thread used.

The CATBIRD is dressed in plain slate-color. He is a near relative of the mockingbird, and better known in the Eastern States. He is also a fine singer, though he is not so famous. This is partly because he sings usually from the middle of a thick bush and so is not seen, and partly because he does not sing so loud. There is a great charm in the catbird's song.

The catbird is a charming fellow aside from his music. He is as knowing as the mockingbird, and not much afraid of people. He will come near to houses to nest, and if not frightened or disturbed, he will be very familiar.

Like many other birds, the catbird is kind to others in trouble. A pair had a nest near that of a pair of robins. One day the robins disappeared--killed, no doubt--and the young in the nest began to cry. When one of the catbirds came with food for its own nestlings, the robin babies would cry to be fed too. Pretty soon the catbirds began to feed them. And at night, when bird babies need to be covered up by the warm feather-bed of their mother's breast, one of the friendly catbirds filled her place, and kept them warm all night. So it went on till both families were grown up and could fly.

One writer says: "All day long the catbird watches over the fruit-trees, and kills the insects that would destroy them or the fruit. Of course he takes his share, especially of cherries, but for every one he takes, he eats thousands of insects. Where there are no small birds, there will be no fruit." Thirty grasshoppers have been found in one small catbird's stomach by the Department of Agriculture.

A story showing how much the catbird knows and understands is of one in Iowa who had a nest in some vines over a porch. A tornado tore the vines so as to uncover the nest, and the lady of the house feared some one would disturb it. So she began to draw the vines together around it to hide it. While she was doing this, one of the old birds came and began to shriek, and cry, and fly round her head, threatening to dash at her eyes. The mate came too, and acted in the same way, supposing, no doubt, that she was doing some harm to their nest. She shielded her head and finished the work, and went into the house.

The next morning she was sitting on the balcony the other side of the house. All at once a catbird flew down and perched on the railing within six feet of her, which no catbird had ever done before. She kept still, and he began jerking his body and uttering sweet little calls and twitters, turning his head this side and that, with eyes fixed on her. He acted exactly as if he were talking to her, and after a while he broke out with a song, low and very sweet. She sat still, and after the song he began his twittering again, then sang once more. She had never heard anything so beautiful, and she was sure that he was trying to express his thanks to her, and his regrets at the way he had treated her the day before. At least, that was the way it seemed to her.

A catbird is as full of fun and pranks as a mockingbird. He may sometimes be seen to do what looks like playing jokes on others. A lady told me she saw a catbird drive a crow nearly wild by mocking his "caw." He cawed as well as the crow himself, and the crow was furious, dashing down at his small tormentor, and in every way showing anger at what no doubt seemed a great insult.

The THRASHER, or BROWN THRUSH, is also of this family. He is reddish brown on the back, and heavily spotted on the breast, and he has a long tail which he jerks about a good deal.

He is known all over the Eastern and Southern States, and his California brother is almost exactly like him. He is a fine singer, and has been called the French mockingbird. Sometimes it is hard to tell his song from the mockingbird's.

The thrasher's nest is usually made in a bush, the thickest and thorniest that can be found, and the brave little parents will make a great fight to keep their nestlings from harm. At one time, when a boy went to carry off some young thrashers, the old birds called together quite an army of birds to help defend them. There were at least fifty birds of many kinds, all flying around his head, screaming at him and trying to pick at his eyes. The boy was ashamed, and put back the little ones, glad to get away with his eyes safe.

A Western bird, the Arizona thrasher, builds a nest in the middle of a cactus so full of sharp thorns like fine needles that it is a wonder how the birds can get into it. They pull off the thorns to make a passage, but the nestlings do sometimes get caught and die there. They must, however, be safe from most enemies. One pair that Mr. Palmer tells about built a regular hallway of sticks six or eight inches long.

All the birds of this family have great individuality; that is, no two are alike. The better you know birds, the more you will see that they do not act, or sing, or even look exactly alike. That is one reason why they are so interesting to study.

VIII

THE DIPPER FAMILY

(_Cinclidæ_)[7]

THERE is only one member of this family in the United States, and that one lives in the Rocky Mountains and the mountains of California. It is the AMERICAN DIPPER, or WATER OUZEL.

The body of the ouzel is about as big as a robin's, but looks much smaller, because his very short tail gives him a "chunky" look. His wings are short and rounded, and his plumage is very soft and so thick that he can go under water without getting wet. He is slate-color all over, a little paler on the breast, and his mate is exactly like him, but the young ouzel has all the under feathers tipped with white, and usually a white throat. Both old and young have shining white eyelids which show very plainly among their dark feathers.

The dipper is a water lover. The nest is placed close to it, generally near a waterfall, sometimes even behind a waterfall, where he has to go through a curtain of falling water to reach it. It is on a shelf of rock, and shaped like a little hut, with a hole on one side for a door. It is made of soft green moss, which is kept alive and growing by constant sprinkling. Sometimes the waterfall itself keeps it wet, but the birds have been seen to sprinkle it themselves. They do it by diving into the water, then going to the top of the nest and shaking themselves violently.

This bird is a curious fellow. His food is the small insects which live under water, and he is as much at home there as other birds are in the air. He can walk on the bottom with swift running water over his head, and he can really fly under water, using his wings as he does in the air. I have seen him do it.

The water ouzel cares nothing for the cold. On cold mornings when all other birds sit humped up with feathers puffed out over their feet to keep warm, he is as jolly and lively as ever. He flies about in the snow, dives under the ice, and comes out at an airhole, and sings as if it were summer weather.

Mr. John Muir, who knows so well the Western mountains and the creatures who live there, has told us most of what we know about this bird. He says the ouzel sings all winter, and never minds the weather; also that he never goes far from the stream. If he flies away, he flies close over the brook, and follows all its windings and never goes "across lots."

When the young ouzel is out of the nest and wants to be fed, he stands on a rock and "dips," that is, bends his knees and drops, then stands up straight again. He looks very droll.

Dr. Merriam tells a story which shows how fond the dipper is of water, especially of a sprinkle, and explains why he always chooses to live by a waterfall. The doctor was camping out on the bank of a stream where one of these birds lived, and one morning he threw some water out of a cup. Instantly the bird flew into the little shower as if he liked it. To see if he really wanted to get into the water, the doctor threw out some more. Again the bird flew into it, and as long as he would throw out water, the ouzel would dash in for his sprinkle.

Besides showing that the water ouzel likes water, this little story shows another thing,--that birds are not naturally afraid of us. On far-off islands where men have seldom been, birds do not run away from people. They have not learned to fear them. They will come up to men, perch on their shoulders, and ride with them on their boats. I have read that in Norway, where everybody is kind to birds, they are not at all afraid. They will come into a barn or a house when the weather is cold, or they are hungry, and no man or boy thinks of frightening or hurting them.

Mr. C. Lloyd Morgan has reared many birds by hatching the eggs in an incubator, so that they cannot be taught by their parents. He says that the birds of the wildest parents hatched in that way are never afraid of people who move quietly, or of a cat, or a quiet dog. Any sudden movement startles a young bird, but they are as much afraid of a dead leaf blown by the wind as they are of a hawk. It is the suddenness that alarms them. Some of them stop instantly on a sudden noise, like a sneeze or a cough. If one foot happens to be raised to step, they will hold it so, and if the head is one side, it will stay so, exactly as if they were all turned to stone.

FOOTNOTE:

[7] See Appendix, 6.

IX

THE WAGTAIL FAMILY

(_Motacillidæ_)[8]

IT does not seem very polite to call a family of birds wagtails, just because they have the habit of jerking their tails as they go about. But that is the name they go by in the books, and we have two of them in the United States. We call them pipits or titlarks.

The best known is SPRAGUE'S PIPIT, called the Missouri skylark, or sometimes the prairie skylark. This bird gets the name of skylark because he sings while soaring about in the air far over our heads. He could not sing on a tree if he wanted to, for he lives on the plains between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains, where are few or no trees.

The pipits live on the ground, and walk and run, not hop. As they go, they bob their heads, and jerk their tails. They are a little larger than an English sparrow, and they go in flocks. They are never seen in the woods, but in open pastures or plains, or beside a road.

Sprague's Pipit is all in streaks of brown and gray, and lighter below. He has a large foot, which shows that he lives on the ground, and a very long claw on the hind toe.

The nest of the pipit is made by hollowing out a little place in the ground and lining it with fine grasses. Though on the ground, it is one of the hardest to find, because it is lightly covered with the dry grasses, and when the bird is sitting, she matches the grasses so well that one can hardly see her, even when looking right at her.

The birds eat insects and weed seeds, and go about in flocks. Even then they are hard to see, because when they are startled they do not flutter or fly, but crouch or squat at once, and stay perfectly still.

This bird is noted, as I said, for his song. It is said to be as fine as that of the English skylark of which we hear so much. Perhaps his way of singing makes it still more interesting. He starts up on wing, flies a little one way, then the other, all the time going higher and higher. So he climbs on up, up, up, in a zigzag way, till he is fairly out of sight, all the time giving a wonderfully sweet song. It is not very loud, but of such a kind that it is heard when the bird is far out of sight. When he can no longer be seen, one may still follow him with a good field-glass. He will sing without stopping for fifteen or twenty minutes.

Then suddenly he stops, closes his wings, and comes head first towards the ground. It seems as if he would dash his brains out against the earth, but just before he touches, he opens his wings and alights like a feather, almost where he started from. He should be as famous as the English bird, and will be, no doubt, when he is better known.

One of the things which make bird-study so interesting to us is that there is so much to be found out about our birds. European birds have been studied much longer, but we have still many beautiful ones whose manners and ways of living are almost unknown. These things are left for you young folk to find out when you are grown up.

FOOTNOTE:

[8] See Appendix, 7.

X

THE WARBLER FAMILY

(_Mniotiltidæ_)[9]

THE gayest, the liveliest, and almost the smallest of our birds are the warblers. Some of them are not over five inches long from the tip of the beak to the end of the tail. Almost all wear bright colors, and the pair are never alike, while the youngsters are different from both.

But few of them warble. Then why are they named so? Well, I haven't found out; but we must call them warblers because that is their name in the books. Most of them have funny little songs of a few notes, which they jerk out every minute as they scramble about on the trees.

We have seventy species of these little birds in the United States, and every one is working as hard as he can from morning till night, for our benefit. For every one eats insects, and enormous numbers of them. Some scramble over trees and pick them out from bud and blossom and under leaves, others go over the bark, and others fly out like flycatchers.

Some of them work in the tops of tall trees, others work in the orchards, some in bushes, and some on the ground. But wherever they live, they are beautiful to look at, and bewitching to study.

Though they are little, they have plenty of spirit. I know of one kept in a room with several other birds, all bigger than himself. You might think he would be treated as big boys would treat a little one. But no, indeed! the tiny fellow made himself ruler of the whole party. He took the biggest bathing-dish, the best seed-cup, and the most desirable perch, and drove away any big bird who dared to claim either.

The YELLOW WARBLER, found all over the country, is often called the wild canary, for, as you see him fly, he appears to be entirely yellow, but when you get nearer, you will see that on his breast are fine stripes of reddish brown. His mate is all in yellow-olive color.

They are very sweet little creatures, and make one of the prettiest nests in America. It is usually in an upright fork of a tree, or bush. It is made of fine material, among the rest a good deal of a gray silky stuff which gives it a beautiful look.

This bird is one of the few who will not bring up a cowbird baby. When the tiny mother finds a cowbird's egg in her nest, she builds another story on top of the nest, leaving the egg to spoil. Sometimes a cowbird finds the second nest, and then the warbler adds a third story. Nests have been found three stories high, with a dried-up cowbird egg in each of the two lower stories.

A strange thing happened once to a pair of yellow warblers. When the nest was done and the eggs laid, a storm threw it out of place, and tipped it over to one side, so that the little mother did not dare trust it for a cradle. So she built another nest in the same bush, and went to sitting on that.

One day a bird-lover chanced to see the two nests, one with the bird sitting, the other tipped partly over and left with the eggs still in it. To see what the birds would do, he put the fallen nest back in place, and made it firm, and then went away. The little pair looked at the nest, and had a great deal of chatter over it. It was their own nest and their own eggs, but the mother could not sit in two places.

Finally, the singer took his place on the restored nest. After that it was watched, and the two birds sat on the two nests till all the young were hatched, and then fed and reared them. When they were ready to fly, the happy birds had a big family to take care of.

* * * * *

Besides these tiny fellows that we call warblers, there are four bigger birds classed with the family, who do not look or act like warblers. They are the golden-crowned thrush or oven-bird, the water-thrush, the Louisiana water-thrush, and the yellow-breasted chat.

The OVEN-BIRD gets his name from the nest, which is shaped like an old-fashioned oven. It is on the ground in the woods, often on the side of a little slope. It has a roof over it covered with sticks and leaves like the ground around it, so that it is hard to see.

If you were to see this bird walking about on the ground, as he does, you would think him a thrush. He is something the same color, and he has a speckled breast like a thrush. His mate is dressed in the same way, and they have a dull yellowish stripe over the crown.

He is the fellow you hear in the woods, calling "Teacher! teacher! teacher!" He is found all over the United States east of the Rocky Mountains.

The YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT is perhaps the drollest bird in North America. He is a beautiful bird, nearly as large as an oriole, olive green above and brilliant yellow below, and his mate is the same. He is found all over the country south of the latitude of Massachusetts. In the West and California, the chat is a little more gray in color, and has a longer tail. He is called the long-tailed chat, but a chat is the same funny fellow, wherever he is found.

He reminds one of a clown, he plays so many antics, and makes such queer sounds, hardly in the least like a song. He will whistle, bark like a puppy, mew like a cat, or laugh like an old man, all in a loud, strange voice.

Besides this, the chat is a ventriloquist, that is, can make his voice appear to come from some place far off, when he is near, and so fool us. The chat has a way of flying up into the air with wings fluttering and legs dangling as if they were not well fastened on, and looking as if he would fall to pieces himself. He does not like to be seen, either. He prefers to hide in a thick bush, and make all sorts of strange noises to deceive one.

The one thing a chat hates more than anything else is to have his nest found. I have known a chat to desert a nest with three lovely eggs in it, just because it was looked at, though neither nest nor eggs were touched.

I found that nest myself, and I wanted very much to see how the birds live and bring up the little ones, so I was careful not to disturb anything. I hid myself a long way off, where I could see the nest with a field-glass, and where I thought the birds would not notice me. I sat there perfectly still for hours, till the eggs had time to get cold, and I saw another bird carry them off. No doubt they saw me, however, for they never came back to the nest.

FOOTNOTE:

[9] See Appendix, 8.

XI

THE VIREO FAMILY

(_Vireonidæ_)[10]

THE vireos are a small family, fifty species, found only in America. They are very quietly dressed in greenish olive hues, with hardly a bright color among them. They were once called greenlets.

They all live in trees and catch insects, going about over the twigs. They sing as they go, like the warblers, combining work and play. Some of them sing almost without stopping, and it gets to be rather tiresome after a while. One or two of them even sing on the nest, which hardly another bird does.

The vireos make the prettiest nests. They are swinging baskets, hung between the forks of a twig, and usually near the end, where they rock in every breeze. They are not often very high. The birds are easily tamed by one who is quiet, and careful not to frighten them.

Mr. Torrey found a vireo on her nest, and by gentle ways got her to let him stroke her. Next day he took some rose leaves with aphides on them, and holding one of the insects on his finger, he offered it to the bird on the nest. She took it, and then another and another, till finally she began to be very eager for them, and he could hardly feed her fast enough. Then he took a teaspoon full of water up to her, and she drank.

Another gentleman--Mr. Hoffmann--did still more. He coaxed a YELLOW-THROATED VIREO till she took food out of his lips. Black ants and cankerworms were the things he fed her. She preferred the ants, and would scold him a little at first when he offered the worms, though she took them at last. This bird was so tame she would let a man lift her off her nest and put her on his shoulder while he looked at the eggs. She would stay there till he put her back.

The yellow-throat, besides making a pretty hanging basket, covers the outside with lichens of different colors, green, dark and light, yellow, and almost black. It is said that these pretty things are put on by the male while his mate is sitting.

A pair was once watched at their building. The female was lining and shaping the inside, and her mate working silky-looking strips from plants into the framework, and then covering the whole with lichens. He was so happy, he sang as he worked.

The one of this family most widely spread over the country, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, is the WARBLING VIREO. His song is the most agreeable of the vireo songs, being truly a warble of six or eight notes, of which one does not get tired. The dress of the Western warbling vireo is a little paler, but the habits and manners are about the same as those of his Eastern brother.

Vireos were once common in the shade-trees of our city streets, and are still in some places where English sparrows have not taken everything, and boys are not allowed to throw stones or shoot. I know one city in Massachusetts where trees are very lovely and musical with yellow-throats.

We can still have these and other birds in our yards--we who do not live in the middle of a big city--by protecting them from cats and bad boys, and furnishing good places to nest. Mr. Lloyd Morgan tells of a garden near his own where there were fifty-three nests, besides swallows'. The owner planted thick bushes, and some cone-bearing trees. He put bird-boxes and old flower-pots and other things suitable to build in, in convenient places in the trees. The birds appreciated all this and came and stayed with him.

FOOTNOTE:

[10] See Appendix, 9.

XII

THE SHRIKE FAMILY

(_Laniidæ_)[11]

A SHRIKE is a pretty gray bird with white and black trimmings. He is nearly as large as a robin, and has a bill slightly hooked on the end. This is to help catch living prey, for he eats mice and other little mammals, besides grasshoppers, crickets, and sometimes small birds.

This family have a curious habit of sticking dead grasshoppers, or mice, or other food, on a thorn, to keep till they are wanted. Because of this habit they have been called butcher-birds.