Rural School Leaflet 



112! 



sort of box may be selected by a pair of bluebirds for their home, but 

 the one that looks most like the old hollow liinb in the orchard will prove 

 most attractive. The entrance hole should be made on one side near 

 the top, and should be about an inch and a half in diameter. No nesting 

 material should be placed in the box, unless perhaps a little sawdust 

 in order to make it seem more like a real cavity. When the bluebirds 

 have once found the box, they may return to it year after year. 



The bluebird builds a well-fonned nest of rootlets and grasses, and from 

 three to five pale blue eggs are laid in it. Both birds take turns sitting on 

 the eggs, which hatch in less than two weeks. The young remain in the 

 nest about two weeks longer; and for some time after they have left the 

 nest, they are fed in the trees by their parents. Before the}^ are able to 

 shift for themselves, however, the parent birds begin a second nest. 

 Occasionally they pull out the first nest and build the second in the same 

 box, but oftener they move to another site; so that it is always well to 

 provide more than one box. 



The 3'oung bluebirds when they leave the nest do not resemble either 

 of their parents, for their backs are marked with whitish and their breasts 

 have dark spots. In the latter respect they show their relationship to 

 the true thrushes, all of which in some plrunage have spotted breasts. 



In the late summer and fall the bluebirds gather in scattered flocks, 

 often associating with chipping sparrows, and are found all through 

 the open farming country. Their call at this season, tur-ree, tur-ree, 

 while quite as friendly as the note of spring, has just a tinge of sadness, 

 and seems as much a part of the fall months as are the calls of the katy- 

 dids or the rustle of the dead leaves. 



CHIPPING SPARROW 



Size. — Smaller than an English 

 sparrow. 



General color. — Above dark 

 brown, streaked; below grayish 

 white without streaks or spots. 



Distinctive features. — The reddish 

 cap, a black line from the bill 

 through the eye, and the unstreaked 

 breast will distin<mish it. 



With the exception of the robin, 

 perhaps no one of our native birds 

 is more sociably inclined than the 

 chipping sparrow. Hopping about 



Chipping sparrow 



