THRUSH COUSINS 



jaunty fashion, singing away as every happy Httle wren 

 should. They build a conspicuous globular nest sus- 

 pended well up among the reeds or rushes. Entrance 

 is by a little round hole in one side. The chamber is 

 softly lined with plant down, and rather late in June 

 contains from five to nine very dark little eggs of a 

 mahogany-brown color. A curious trait of this w^ren 

 is that it builds a number of dummy nests, apparently 

 to mislead intruders. One will often examine half a 

 dozen nests before the finished and occupied one is 

 found. 



The Short-billed Marsh Wren is similar in many of 

 its habits, but is even more secretive and mouse-like 

 than the other. It keeps more to low, thick meadow 

 grass, and builds a nest similar to that of the other, 

 but low down in a tussock. The equally numerous 

 eggs are, however, pure white. The sitting bird will 

 sneak off the nest and be hiding in the grass close by, 

 despite all one's efforts to kick it out. I succeeded 

 once in getting a photograph of one near its nest in a 

 meadow by setting the camera focused on a nearby 

 bush on which I saw it several times alight. Standing 

 off in the distance, holding the thread connected with 

 the shutter, I had a friend chase the little rascal. It 

 took short flights from bush to bush, until once it 

 alighted just where I wanted it. Often it would get 

 just under the bush, and I would walk up and poke at 

 it with a switch to try to make it fly up higher. But 

 instead it would run like a mouse off into the grass. 



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