Rqral School Leaflet. 1009 



The summer home of the Snowflake is in the far north where the 

 summers are short and cool and the winters long and exceedingly 

 cold. There they build their nests on the ground and line them with 

 feathers. Then when their little ones can leave their cozy homes and 

 follow, they gather together in large flocks and start toward the south. 

 But unlike many birds they are fond of the winter and leave their 

 northern home only as their food is covered by the snow and travel 

 south only far enough to find food. It is for this reason that we see 

 more of them during January and February when the snows in the 

 north are exceedingly deep. 



SUGGESTIONS 



A. M'^hat to look for. — A bird about the size of a sparrow, very white, 

 traveling in flocks. 



B. Where to look. — Open weedy fields, often near the house but 

 preferably in the more open country. 



C. General. — i. Note the build of the bird with its large head and 

 shoulders and heavy bill, — is it a sparrow? 



2. Look for the Snowflake's tracks in the snow. Does it hop as 

 do the Junco and tree sparrow or does it run? 



3. Watch the flock as it rises from the ground or as it is about to 

 alight and see in what unison they turn or circle. 



4. Do they ever alight on trees? On fences? 



5. What other birds do not alight in trees? 



A PLANT AT SCHOOL 

 By L. H. Bailey 



I dropped a seed into the earth. It grew, and the plant was mine. 



It was a wonderful thing, this plant of mine. I did not know its 

 name, and the plant did not bloom. All I know is that I planted 

 something apparently as lifeless as a grain of sand and that there 

 came forth a green and living thing unlike the seed, unlike the soil 

 in which it stood, unlike the air into which it grew. No one could 

 tell me why it grew, nor how. It had secrets all its own, secrets that 

 baffle the wisest men ; yet this plant was my friend. It faded when I 

 withheld the light, it wilted when I neglected to give it water, it 



