An Evening with Birds in Florida 



By J. W. LIPPINCOTT. Bethayres, Pa. 



EVEN in Florida, winter is the time of unsettled weather. In the northern 

 part it may be 80 degrees in the shade one day and 20 the next. Never- 

 theless there are quantities of birds always at hand. At dawn the 

 Mocker awakens the world by that harsh cry which every other Mockingbird 

 in Florida seems to repeat until the woods resound. Instantly Jays are heard, 

 Red-winged Blackbirds begin to fly, Flickers, Sapsuckers and other Woodpeckers 

 commence to feed; the Robins, flying in flocks, seek the edges of lakes where 

 gall- berries are ripening, and from all kinds of impossible places, like bramble 

 thickets, palmetto beds, and swamp tussocks comes a host of other birds. All 

 are busy until the sun is well up, then one after another vanishes — where one 

 rarely knows — until, just before night, the rush for roosting-places comes. 



Evening in Florida after a pleasant, sunny day is intensely interesting. 

 Let us say that one is moored in a boat in some grass- or lily-studded lake that 

 has a live-oak hummock on one side and on the other, grassy flats, and then 

 the pine-covered sand-hills. The sun is very low, and the reflections in the 

 quiet water clear-cut and many-colored. 



Tree Swallows have just been dipping their bills for the last hasty drink, 

 but now there is a hush — no bird is in sight. Then on the horizon appear several 

 dots; they come nearer steadily, but are high. Eight Little Blue Herons, two 

 in the whitish plumage of the young bird, pass westward. To the flats now 

 drops a noisy band of Red-wings, and then silently a flock of Meadowlarks, 

 the latter spreading among the grass instead of in the sedge clumps. Robins 

 that have been feeding on sumac berries on a little island hurry away as if 

 making room for a dozen Doves that noisily alight in a clump of live oaks. 

 From the hummock comes the insistent rasp of Brown Thrashers which are 

 worried by some gray squirrels overhead. Here, too. Quail are whistling — not 

 the bob-white of summer, but a more plaintive rallying call. Two Red-tailed 

 Hawks are already roosting in the moss-festooned live oaks, but they make no 

 sound. 



A mass like a cloud appears over the trees, cah, cali-hah, cah-cah. It is the 

 Crow army returning to the great roost on Sorghum Hill, near where the 

 Turkey Buzzards congregate for the night, on dead trees over the river — 446 

 Florida Crows — the evening before it was 449 — flapping along in a straggling 

 column at least a mile long. They look at everything they pass, some sportively 

 swoop at a Sparrow Hawk, others circle and drop low to see what is going on 

 among the Meadowlarks. Curiosity impels others to follow, but they see the 

 main column flying steadily on, and so quickly rejoin it. Now and then a Crow- 

 drops back to talk to one far behind — cah-cah, cah-hah. The column fades 

 away toward the setting sun, and the even swish of nearly a thousand wings is 

 no longer heard. 



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