To encourage observation and interest in keeping rec- 

 ords, the best original articles written on nature subjects are 

 published in an attractive bulletin issued each year. The 

 bulletin for 1920 contained in addition to the lists of the 

 officers, active and honorary members and reports of the 

 officers, the following original articles: "A List of 88 Birds 

 Seen and Identified on the Field Trips Taken by the Audubon 

 Societies'"; "A Typical Field Trip"; "My Birdhouse Tenants 

 During the Summer of 1920"; "My Bluebirds" and "The Life 

 History of the Rice-bush Silk Moth." The bulletin for 1921 

 promises to equal, if not surpass, the excellent efforts made 

 by the boys and girls last year. 



Sometime during the month of October, an annual exhi- 

 bit is arranged in the Biology Museum of the Science Build- 

 ing, which gives the parents of the boys and girls and the 

 friends of the societies an opportunity to see the nature 

 of the work the young people are doing. At the exhibit last 

 Fall, there were five general groups of entries as follows: 

 Bird houses; Color work; Insect collections; Used nests; 

 and Photography, all of which represented the original work 

 of the members. Prizes were given for the best work in each 

 division of the exhibit. The bird houses were made in many 

 varied designs, some of which required great skill for their 

 construction. A large number of the houses were occupied 

 by birds during the summer, a coveted recognition which 

 added tremendously to the interest in bird house building. 

 The construction of the bird houses, as well as the color 

 work, is done in co-operation with the Art and Manual Train- 

 ing Departments of the Brunswick High School. The color 

 work is chiefly of birds which are studied at the weekly 

 meetings. At these meetings each member is provided with 

 an Audubon educational leaflet which contains 4 pages of 

 text, a colored plate and an outline drawing of the birds 

 and objects of the colored plate. The latter is painted in 

 water color or crayon, as the boy or girl prefers. Such 

 work not only increases skill in coloring but it also teaches 

 the marks and colors of the bird in a way that pages of des- 

 cription could not possibly do. 



In the collecting of used-nests, the members are cau- 

 tioned not to disturb nests which are in the process of build- 

 ing or which contain eggs or young. As soon as the young 

 have flown, the nest is carefully removed and, with a card 

 containing all the data obtained concerning the nest and life 

 history of the birds, is preserved in the museum. The nests 

 exhibited represent a varied type of bird architecture, from 

 the mud nests of the swallows and the simple ground nest of 



42 



