676 ANNUAL REPORI) OF THE Off. Doc. 



Warren, have never been known to attack live poultry, but owing 

 to the general bad name of the hawk family, and the inability of 

 knowing one member of it from another, all alike pay the penalty 

 of death. 



The bird's winter may truly be said to begin with October, for 

 with that month all the summer birds leave us. September takes 

 the majority, and the few brave hearts, like the blue bird and song 

 sparrow, that sometimes endure the cold of entire winter, are the 

 exceptions and not the rule. It is strange — this passing of the birds. 

 Day by day through the beautiful autumn weather, these sweet- 

 voiced, gaily dressed visitors, flock and go. Day by day through 

 the early springtime, our more quietly robed winter guests prepare 

 to depart — silently, mysteriously. 



How does that tiny wren who told us so sweetly last May, sum- 

 mer was nearly here, know that with September he and summer 

 must leave together? Look at Robin. It it is a bright morning in 

 October, and he and his fellows are seemingly having a merry time 

 up in the orchard trees, talking and calling quite as if it were April. 

 Look and listen if you will, for a like opportunity may not again be 

 yours until many a snowy blanket has covered the old orchard. 



After all the successful bird student is like the successful farmer. 

 As the old woman said, he must have a "turn," If he has no "turn," 

 he might just as well be a — well, he might just as well be a politi- 

 cian. He might make a good politician without a "turn," though 

 it is always a risk, but he would make a very poor ornithologist, 

 and a worse farmer. I have found that a pleasant way to study my 

 neighbors is from a window. I do not mean neighbors in this con- 

 nection, although, perchance, the same method for them would be a 

 good one. I nailed a piece of fat beef to a tree one cold- winter day, 

 and from a cosy corner within doors, watched for hungry birds. My 

 first guest was a white-breasted nut hatch, evidently delighted with 

 his dinner. When a bit of snow fell off the meat, he ran down the 

 tree to get it, perhaps thinking it a morsel of beef and not wishing to 

 waste any. He went up and down with great celerity, and how he 

 did "dig" the meat with his strong beak. He would sometimes take 

 a morsel to the other side of the tree, as if to eat at his leisure, 

 while hiding from me; then back he would come, hungry as ever. 

 The nut hatch has an amusing habit of throwing his black-crowned 

 head back, probably to listen, his long, pointed beak erect in the air, 

 for all the world like a turned up nose, and his round, plump body 

 in an attitude of close attention. He is a comfortable looking little 

 creature. With him ignorance is bliss. It doesn't make any differ- 

 ence to the nut hatch whether there is a gold or silver standard of 

 money, and yet he seems happy, and whether he misses anything by 

 this lack of knowledge is for him to know and you and me to find 

 out. 



The tiny brown creeper with his long slender tail, which always 

 seems to drag behind him, came more timidly to the banquet, and he 

 could not run down the tree, but always flew down, alighted on the 

 bark, and then up. The creeper is a greater stranger than the nut. 

 hatch, being less common and less easily seen, as he resembles so 

 nearly the bark on which he hunts his insect fare. He never stayed 

 long at the meat, and seemed to prefer to hunt his insects. 



