I02 Bire-Lore 



the Catbird and Brown Thrasher, even feeding their young on cracked nuts. 

 The favorite food with them all was found to be the native nuts — black wal- 

 nut, hickorynut, pecan, and butternut, in the order named — and they would 

 eat nothing else, even English walnuts and peanuts being discarded, so long 

 as those mentioned are provided. We have never yet succeeded in inducing 

 any bird to eat cocoanut. The Catbirds, both old and young, were among 

 the most frequent visitors to the feeding-boxes^ though nearly all species 

 came.* The Brown Thrasher was never seen to enter the boxes, but picked 

 up from the ground beneath them the bits which had been dropped by the other 

 birds. Suet also is as much relished by the birds in summer as in winter, and 

 we have often seen the Catbird feeding its young with it. 



The feeding of 'soft-billed' birds, such as the Robin, Bluebird, and 

 Mockingbird in severe winter weather is a problem which we have not been 

 able to solve satisfactorily. Probably the best way to provide for these is by 

 planting sufficiently numerous shrubs, etc., which bear fruits they are fond of, 

 as the dogwood, various cornels, red cedar, deciduous holly, pokeberry, 

 etc.; though the failure to produce fruit certain seasons, or the circum- 

 stance that the fruits of some of these do not 'hang on' until severe weather 

 comes,f makes this fall short of being an entirely satisfactory measure. We 

 have not yet tried prepared Mockingbird food which, although expensive, 

 might answer the purpose, though, like other moist goods, it would be likely 

 to become frozen hard in severe weather. J 



The same individual birds that were first attracted to the feeding-boxes are 

 still with us — at least some of them are, for they cannot be mistaken; for 

 example, a one-legged Carolina Chickadee and a Tufted Titmouse with a par- 

 tially disabled wing. The former has been a cripple since one day in February 

 last, when it returned to the box with one foot extended straight out beneath 

 the tail and immovably fixed in that position. Evidently it had been wrenched 

 out of place in some way, possibly by catching the foot in a crotch as the bird 

 started to fly. Some time in May the leg had quite disappeared, and ever 

 since the little fellow has managed very well with one only; in fact it is wonder- 

 ful how skillfully he manages to tuck a bit of nut under the toes of his one foot 

 and hold it there while he pecks it into pieces small enough for him to swallow 

 The disabled Titmouse is one of a brood of young which, early in the season 



*The most frequent and regular visitors to the nut-boxes were the Tufted Titmouse 

 Carolina Chickadee, Catbird, Chipping Sparrow, and (in winter) the Slate-colored Junco. 

 Frequent but less regular were the visitsof the Red-bellied Woodpecker, Downy Woodpecker, 

 and Bewick's Wren. 



fOn the 2ist of October, the deciduous hollies in the bottoms of the Little Wabash 

 River had already been nearly stripped of their fruit by the thousands of Robins which had 

 congregated there. This tree (or large shrub) is known locally as, 'turkey-berry, from the 

 circumstance that wild turkeys were very partial to its fruit. 



tA friend, who is a devoted lover of birds and for many years has in every way encour- 

 aged them on her fine place, told us that her Robins were very fond of pot-cheese (otherwise 

 known as cottage cheese or smear-case), and are so tame as to take it from her hand; this 

 in summer, however. At this lady's home, where dense shrubbery and dense vine growths 

 abound, she, this season, counted fifteen nests of the Brown Thrasher; and in a rose-arch 

 near the house were, at the same time, nests of three species (Robin, Cardinal, and Mourn- 

 ing Dove), within two or three feet of one another! 



