A Second Season of Bluebird Tenants 



67 



cesses which the sight provoked in our lihiehird's miiul, the reaction was ])rompt, 

 and after one unsuccessful attempt slie went sailing out of the window with the 

 pencil in her bill. At tirst thought this might seem a stujnd act, but it must be 

 rememl)ered that lead-pencils are by no means so familiar to lilueljirds as ihev 

 are to us, and the occasion was hardly one to call for abstract reasoning. It 

 was a case of getting food, and the trial-and-error method which the bird employed 

 we should probabl}' have used in a similar situation. 



It was an exciting moment for the parents when the first nestling tumbled 

 out on to the nest-porch and then down to the shelf below. Thev hovered about, 

 scolding loudly, but soon they were feeding both it and the voung still in the nest. 

 Number one stayed for some time about the window before it was joined bv 



-MALE BLUEBIRD AT THE DISH, THREE YOUNG ON THE SHELF RIM. JUNE 10 



number two. Once it wiped its bill deliberately on the shelf-rim. Once it fell 

 into the room, and showed some fear as I hastened to pick it up. 



Within the nest, the reaction of the young to the arrival of the parents had 

 been tuned to the stimulus of sound or of mechanical vibrations, and it was 

 curious to notice now their failure to respond to the stimulus of sight. The 

 mother-bird's mind could not e.xplain their frequent refusal to open their mouths 

 as she came with food, and she continued to go through the movements of feed- 

 ing, striking at their heads with the worm still in her bill. Sometimes they reacted 

 after several blows had been rained upon their heads, but frequently they remained 

 unmoved. 



Number two had no sooner left the shelf than number three appeared at 

 the nest-hole. Calling tiirivee, but getting no response from its parents, it dropped 

 back to the nest. A Httle later it scrambled up again, and sat halfway out on the 



