110 



Bird - Lore 



tlio Ijird is awake, and csi)ccially if it is 

 iif^ht, the means of fretting back to sleep 

 are probably few, and the bird sings rather 

 than do nothing at all. It may be that 

 singing becomes a habit with a few indi- 

 viduals, but I believe that it is rarely so. 

 I can see no reason why a bird should 

 waken himself to sing, or why he should 

 waken his mate just to have her listen, 

 when both of them are likely more in need 

 of sleep than at any other season of the 

 year. I feel quite sure of myself in saying 

 this, for frequently on nights before storms 

 when there was absolutely no wind blow- 

 ing, the Mocker would not be at his singing 

 post. It is not the policy of a good, healthy 

 normal bird to be idle if he is awake. If 

 there ever was a busy creature it is 

 certainly a bird. Night is no time for a 

 day bird to find anything to eat — perhaps 

 he would if he could; then there is no 

 family to feed, no bath to take, so why 

 should he not sing so long as he is awake? 

 That is the way I like to look at it. 



Whether this explanation is satisfactory 

 or not the Chats will go on making the 

 nights lively with their strange noises, and 

 the Mockers singing their accompani- 

 ments to the Texas moon. It is mysterious 

 still ! — George Miksch Sutton, Bethany, 

 W. Va. 



Pied-billed Grebe Caring for Its Young 



The article in July-August, 1914 num- 

 ber of Bird-Lore, 'At Home with the Hell 

 Diver,' was of particular interest to me, 

 recalling as it did the experience of a friend, 

 Mr. Ward Lounsbury, of 520 Axtell St., 

 Kalamazoo, a man of observant habits 

 and unquestioned probity. As told to me, 

 the incident was as follows: 



Early in the summer, four or five years 

 ago, Mr. Lounsbury was spending the day 

 fishing at Atwater's Pond, a few miles 

 southwest of this city. Two Pied-billed 

 (irebes, each accompanied by two young 

 about the size of a week-old chick, were 

 swimming about not far away. After 

 watching them for some time from his boat 

 he determined to try to catch at least 

 one of the young, and moved up toward 



Ihcni. H()wc\'er, lie coultl not tome close 

 enough to reach them as the mothers 

 would take the young upon their backs 

 and so make better speed. Moreover, 

 when too closely pursued or perhaps 

 fatigued, they would push the young from 

 their backs, and evidently giving them a 

 signal which was understood, each baby 

 took a portion of the mother's tail in its 

 bill, and all disappeared under the water, 

 coming up some distance away with the 

 babies still clinging to mother's tail. This 

 was done repeatedly by both groups of 

 birds, until after spending about two 

 hours in the pursuit Mr. Lounsbury gave 

 up the chase, thinking they had earned 

 their freedom. 



Mr. Burroughs tells of the Loon taking 

 its young upon its back and swimming 

 away with them, but I have nowhere read 

 of an instance like the above. — Grace H. 

 Peck, Kalamazoo, Mich. 



Bird-nesting in Texas 



Early Sunday morning, June 3, 1917, 

 Norman Pecore and the writer started out 

 on a bird-trip which we had been looking 

 forward to for several months. With our 

 field-glasses slung over our shoulders and 

 sufficient provisions to carry us through a 

 long strenuous day, we boarded the inter- 

 urban for South Houston, a little settle- 

 ment on the prairie a few miles southeast 

 of this city. 



Arriving at the little station, we turned 

 our faces in the direction of a small pear 

 orchard out in the open prairie which was 

 our destination and started off on a bee- 

 line for it. Several times we flushed sput- 

 tering Meadowlarks from almost under 

 our feet, but a most careful search for nests 

 availed us nothing. Every few feet the 

 dry prairie grass was adorned with wild 

 flowers of different kinds, which caused 

 us to stop and comment on its beauty or 

 perhaps remove their thorns from our cloth- 

 ing and persons. Then we ran across a 

 large colony of fat, sluggish-looking young 

 bugs in different stages of development. 

 These were black with orange-red trim- 

 mings, and wingless. A few in the last 



