42 BLUEBIBB 



in the affections of the people. The bird houses 

 that were put up for it insured its presence in 

 villages and city parks until the introduction of 

 the House Sparrow, but since that time the old 

 familiar friend has had to give way before the 

 quarrelsome stranger. Mr. Xehrling, however, 

 gives us the grateful information that by a simple 

 device the Bluebird boxes may be protected from 

 the Sparrow. It seems that the Sparrow, being 

 no aeronaut, — not to say of earthly mind, — 

 finds difficulty in entering a hole unless there is a 

 perch beside it where, as it were, he can have his 

 feet on the ground. The Bluebird, on the con- 

 trary, aside from his mental cast, is so used to 

 building in old Woodpecker holes, none of which 

 are blessed with piazzas or front-door steps, that 

 he has no trouble in flying directly into a nest 

 hole. So, by making the Bluebird houses without 

 perches, the Sparrows may be kept away. Mr. 

 Nehrling urges that cigar boxes should never be 

 used for bird houses, which is surely wise, for we 

 would neither offend the nostrils of feathered 

 parents nor contaminate the feathered youth. In 

 the south, he tells us, the cypress knees furnish 

 excellent materials for them. He suggests, more- 

 over, that sections of hollow branches and hollow 

 tree trunks can be used in addition to the usual 

 board houses. When this is done, the section of 

 the branch should be sawed in two, bored out for 

 the nest cavity, and then nailed or glued together 



