CAROLINA WREN 211 



hung up in an out-building, and no attention was paid to it until late in the 

 winter when we found, to our surprise, that a pair of Carolina Wrens had en- 

 larged the opening, and were using it as a nightly roosting place. 



The birds continued to roost there until spring ; when they carefully constructed 

 a nest of their own, in the top of the hornets' nest, away from the opening. For 

 some reason, they later abandoned this home in favor of one in a nearby bird box. 



When fall came we waited with interest to see if they would again take up their 

 old abode. Going out to look one frosty morning before daylight, we heard them 

 stirring in the nest, and they used it regularly from then on. This they have 

 repeated every year until the present winter. 



Another nest was placed in the same building last fall, and the resident pair, 

 whether or not the original 1927 individuals we do not know, immediately took 

 up quarters in the enlarged opening of the new nest. In their new home they are 

 plainly visible, and they have allowed us to study them with flashlights. They 

 do not seem to be in the least disturbed when we suddenly turn a light upon 

 them. The outer bird roosts with one wing spread across the opening, and this, 

 perhaps, shuts out most of the light. 



One morning, just at daybreak, I went out to the building where the nests are 

 hung, lighted a small gas stove, and placed before it a bucket of water over which 

 a layer of ice had frozen. Returning in a few minutes, I found both birds perched 

 on the rim of the bucket, as near to the fire as they could get. Whether the heat 

 or the light was the attraction I cannot say, but they presented as charming a 

 bird picture as I have ever seen. 



In The Migrant^ volume 14, pages 1-5, 1943, is a symposium on how 

 birds spend their winter nights. In this the Carolina wren is reported 

 as roosting in a pocket in a shirt that hung on a clothesline, in a fold of 

 an old portiere hanging in a garage, and in a pocket of an old coat that 

 hung on a porch. 



Carolina wrens, like other wrens, are not much given to protracted 

 flights ; most of their short flights in their favorite retreats are erratic 

 dartings from one perch to another or from one log to another; but 

 in longer flights in the open, which they seldom have to make, their 

 flights are direct and straight with rapid beats of their short wings. 

 Most of their activity is near the ground, hopping from branch to 

 branch with sprightly activitj^, or creeping over, around, and under 

 piles of wood and always prying into every nook and crevice in search 

 of spiders and insect food. Several observers have noted their ability 

 to climb the trunks of trees, sometimes to a considerable height, prying 

 into the crevices in the bark for food much after the manner of the 

 creepers. 



Voice. — The Carolina wren is one of our great singers, a beautiful 

 singer and a most persistent singer. It is one of the few birds that 

 sing more or less during every month in the year, though it sings most 

 persistently and most enthusiastically during the late winter and 

 spring months ; it sings in all kinds of weather, spring sunshine, sum- 

 mer rains, or winter snowstorms ; during the height of its song period it 

 may be heard all through the day, from dawn to dusk. It has a varied 



