fltiits from JFtelti anti ^tutip 



Notes from Phillipston, Mass. 



The 'Gardner News,' of Worcester 

 County, Mass., records Evening Gros- 

 beaks at Templeton, February 5. In the 

 afternoon of the same day a flock was seen 

 on Phillipston Common where there are 

 numerous maple trees. The distance be- 

 tween the two places is about four miles. 

 It is not improbable that it was the same 

 flock seen on Templeton Common. 



I saw a pair of Golden-crowned King- 

 lets, January 25. There is no record of 

 their having been seen before in this 

 locality during the winter months. 



Last summer a pair of Traill's Fly- 

 catchers were observed for the first time, 

 and a parent bird was seen with a young 

 bird in the act of feeding it. But for the 

 alarm-notes I might not have detected 

 either. 



A pair of Juncos reared a brood here 

 which is the first record of their being 

 summer residents in this immediate 

 locality. Crows are great disturbers of 

 birds in the country during nesting-time. 

 Last spring twenty crows were counted 

 upon an apple tree about an eighth of a 

 mile from this residence. They doubtless 

 take great numbers of fledglings and eggs. 

 Robins have to use their utmost ingenuity 

 and care in selecting a nesting-site. Last 

 year a pair of Robins built their nest in an 

 oil-can, which was on a shelf in one corner 

 near the roof of a steam mill, to escape 

 the Crows that are abundant every year 

 and perhaps more common than usual 

 during 1915. It is no wonder that there 

 is a scarcity of birds in this region when 

 we realize the depredations of the Crows 

 and the Sharp-shinned Hawk. I do be- 

 lieve, from my own experience, that the 

 latter take two-thirds of the Robins that 

 leave their nests. If an educated person 

 who could identify Hawks and distinguish 

 between the dififerent species were en- 

 gaged by this state to look after the wel- 

 fare of insectivorous birds in the country 



during nesting-time, keeping the Sharp- 

 shinned Hawk and troublesome Crows 

 in abeyance, there would be vastly more 

 birds and they would have a happier and 

 more comfortable time. — Mrs. Myra 

 Dunn, Athol, Mass. 



Winter Notes from Southern 

 Connecticut 



Though the past winter has been the 

 most severe in forty years, there has been 

 a scarcity of winter birds, and only an 

 occasional rare bird from the North, but a 

 number of unusual records for this section. 



A Chipping Sparrow and a Mourning 

 Dove have fed regularly from the same 

 place in a yard at Norwalk all winter. 

 Black-crowned Night Herons have win- 

 tered at Norwalk and at Fairfield, and at 

 the latter place I saw four, one adult and 

 three immature birds, in the spruces in 

 Mrs. Wright's yard the morning of 

 February 25, and these birds have visited 

 the little stream in Birdcraft Sanctuary 

 nightly. 



One was brought to me on February 

 24, having been picked up under a shed 

 and evidently frozen, and it is mounted 

 and in Birdcraft Museum. 



These birds are not given in the 'Birds 

 of Connecticut' after November 17. 



December 26, three Pine Grosbeaks 

 were seen at Fairfield, and the next day 

 were in Birdcraft grounds, just a day late 

 for the Christmas census. 



The last of February I was told of a 

 bird at Bridgeport that puzzled those who 

 had watched it all winter, and, on March 

 3, I went and found it to be a Mocking- 

 bird, and that it had been about Laurel 

 and North Avenue all winter. 



March 3, a flock of eight Evening Gros- 

 beaks was reported to me from Norwalk, 

 and on March 8 one male was reported in 

 the same place and fine observations 

 made. The same day a small flock of Red- 

 polls was reported. — Wilbur F. Smith, 

 South Norwalk, Conn. 



(173) 



