ANIMAL BEHAVIOR, WITH EXAMPLES 



235 



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The Death 



OF THE 



Yellow 

 Warbler 



XE day in the early part 

 of June, I was very 

 -uddenly startled by the 

 most extraordinary plain- 

 tive screams of some little 

 ^ 't^^^H^^^^^^^^^^^m ^^^^ coming from the 

 I ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ yard back of our cot- 

 r^^^^tage. On running to the opened door, I was just 

 If in time to witness a tragedy to a bird on a brush pile. 

 ^ A loggerhead shrike had captured a yellow warbler 

 ; and was squeezing the life out of its little body. When 

 the shrike saw me it flew away with its victim in its feet to 

 another brush pile in the shade of the peach orchard fifty 

 yards away. It had hardly alighted when a stick which I had 

 thrown in an attempt to rescue the warbler struck dangerously 

 near the shrike's body. This act of mine so startled the log- 

 gerhead that, in his haste to depart, the yellow warbler was 

 left behind hanging in a mat of branches. A hasty examina- 

 tion of the little victim showed that it was almost dead, 

 and a moment more a slight quiver evidenced the last life 

 struggle. 



The shrike was one of a pair that were nesting in the vicinity; 

 while the yellow warbler that was killed was a bright-plumaged 

 male, also one of a pair that had established their home nearby 

 and made frequent visits to the apple trees about our dwelling. 

 The shrikes stayed about all the remainder of the summer, 

 but I rarely afterwards saw them attempting to destroy birds. 

 At another time, however, one of these birds came near a 

 Baltimore oriole's nest in a young maple tree. It was the 



