106 BULLETIN 16 7, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Illustrating the boldness and reckless audacity of this little 

 feathered bandit, the time-honored statement by Nuttall, that one in 

 an impetuous dash broke through two thicknesses of greenhouse glass 

 and was brought up only by the third, has been quoted many times. 

 It does not hesitate to dash fearlessly through dense tangles of trees, 

 underbrush, and thickets in pursuit of its prey. F. A. E. Starr 

 writes to me that he saw one dash through the rusty wire of a 

 pheasant pen while chasing a sparrow. Even trapping does not 

 dampen its courage. Harold Michener (1930) says that they are 

 much troubled by sharp-shinned hawks at their bird-banding traps ; 

 they are now capturing the hawks in traps, baited w^ith birds that 

 the hawks have killed, and banding the hawks. One hawk was 

 trapped three times within a few hours. "Usually the hawks are 

 back and into the traps in a very few minutes, sometimes before 

 the one who has set the trap is out of sight." They have no fear 

 of human beings, or have considerable confidence in their own speed, 

 for they often seize a chicken or a sparrow almost under our noses. 

 C. W. Nash (Thompson, 1890) writes : 



On one occasion an impudent villain of this species glanced past my head 

 and snatched up a plover I had shot, carrying it off in front of my dog's 

 nose, and this he did before the report of my gun had died away, and through 

 the smoke from the charge. The act so astonished me that I forgot to shoot 

 at him until he was too far off; when I did remember, I sent the other 

 charge after him, but without effect ; he did not even drop his ill-gotten 

 spoil. On another occasion one followed a redpoll almost into my buggy. 

 On the 22d of August I saw one strike at a Bronzed Grackle and carry it 

 off from where it was feeding in a public street, at Portage la Prairie, although 

 there were many people about. 



Mr. Shelley relates the following in his notes: 



The first seasonal sharp-shinned hawk was seen April 3. On the eighth, at 

 the same place, a pair were seen. This was at the edge of a sugar-maple 

 woods. They were first seen circling about a tree standing away from the 

 other trees, diving at it as if pursuing some intended prey. They did no sailing 

 but flapped in flight. As I drew nearer a gray squirrel was seen part way 

 down the tree, and the two Accipiters constantly lunged at it, driving it to 

 the top of the tree. I had noticed earlier that it commonly fed here on maple 

 buds. Watching tlie hawks, I decided they were merely playing with the 

 squirrel, as, surely as the squirrel got down so low as 30 or 40 feet, it would 

 be driven back to the treetop, where it clung for a space before again at- 

 tempting to get away from its tormentors. For fully 20 minutes this farce 

 went on, until the hawks tired of their play. Perhaps 40 minutes elapsed 

 before the gray gained the ground ; the hawks merely sitting on a con- 

 venient dead limb, not even watchful of its escape. At no time were the 

 rushes and pursuits on the hawk's part of a serious nature but were leisurely, 

 easy, and noiseless. 



Voice. — The ordinary alarm note as the nest is approached, uttered 

 also during the attack on the intruder, sounds to me like kek, kek, 



