making a soft nest of moss, hair and feathers, and laying from six to twelve 

 eggs, which are white, with sjjecks of hrown-red. They hegin to lay ahout the 

 middle or close of April, and though they commonly make use of natural or 

 deserted holes of the woodpecker, yet they frc(|uently excavate a cavity for them- 

 selves with much lahor. The first brood takes wing ahout the 7th of 10th of 

 June, and there is sometimes a second hrood toward the end of July. The y<iung, 

 as soon as fledged, have all the external marks of the adult, the head is equally 

 hlack. and they chatter and skip ahout with all the agility and self-j)ossession of 

 their parents, who appear nevertheless very solicitous for their safety. 



I'Vom this time on the whole family continue to associate together thrcjugh 

 the autumn and winter. They seem to move in concert from tree to tree, keeping 

 up a continued 'tshc-dc-dc-dc-dc and 'tshc-dc-dc-dc-dait, preceded hy a shrill 

 whistle, all the while husily engaged picking around the huds and branches, hang- 

 ing frf)iu their extremities and ])rocecding often in reversed ])osturc. head down- 

 ward, like so many tumblers. l)rying into every crevice of the hark and searching 

 round the roots and in every possible retreat of their insect prey or its larvt'e. 

 If th.e object chance to fall, they industriously descend to the ground and glean it 

 up with the utmost economy. 



Almost the only note of this bird which may be. called a song, is one which 

 is frequently heard at intervals in the depth of the forest, or from the orchard 

 trees. Although more frequently uttered in spring, it is now and then whistled 

 on warm days even in winter; it may be heard, in fact, in every month of the 

 year. It consists of two. or, less frequently, three clearly-whistled and rather 

 melancholy notes, like the syllables phcc-hcc, not drawled like the song of the 

 wood Pewee. and sweeter and more even than the cry of the Phoebe. 



The Chickadee is found in summer in dry, shady and secluded woods, but 

 when the weather becomes cold, and as early as October, roving families, pressed 

 by necessity and failure of their ordinary insect fare, now being to frequent 

 orchards and gardens, appearing extremely familiar, hungry, indigent, but in- 

 dustrious. i)rying with restless anxiety into every cranny of the bark or holes in 

 decayed trees after dormant insects, spiders and larva;. The Chickadee adds 

 by its presence, indomitable action and chatter, an air of cheerfulness to the silent 

 and dreary winters of the coldest parts of Xorth .America. 



The Chickadee is very generally distributed throughout the northern part 

 of eastern Xorth .\merica. Its nest is built as far south as Illinois and Pennsyl- 

 vania, and as far north as Labrador. High up in the .Mleghany Mountains it 

 nests still farther south. In the South and West occur closely related forms with 

 similar habits. 



911 



