Notes from Field and Study 



455 



Turkey Buzzards, and once a Magpie. 

 A steel-trap might completely cut off a 

 leg, capturing and liberating the bird at 

 one stroke. I know that bird accidents are 

 many, but how most of them come to pass 

 I don't know, nor do I know how nature 

 treats the results. I have never been 

 lucky enough to find a bird that had 



ity. It was at this camp that I had the 

 delightful and unusual experience of having 

 one of these birds boldly take meat from 

 my hand, without any preliminary train- 

 ing, and also take food from my hand 

 while I was seated alone in the timber, 

 away from camp and its possible associa- 

 tions of safety, and food abundance. This 



TUGGED HARD' 



dressed its wounds with feathers, or made 

 of them a splint for fractured bones. May 

 be, if I am patient long enough, and keep 

 wide awake and open-minded, I will. 



Born and raised in lands or at altitudes 

 with almost perpetual snow, they are 

 inured to hardships; yet the long, cold 

 winters must press these cheerful Camp- 

 birds hard in their efforts to find food and 

 keep warm. It is small wonder that every- 

 one of them, like a dog after a long fast, 

 swiftly snatches up and hides every least 

 scrap of food. I have often watched one 

 take a large piece of bacon rind almost 

 too heavy to carry, and cache it under the 

 loose bark of a dead tree or stump; and 

 the wish within me has followed just as 

 often, that no other bird or beast might 

 discover it, in order that the bit of food 

 would help the devoted mother bird to 

 keep her eggs warm in the bitter cold of 

 late winter. In the latter part of last 

 June, our camp was constantly visited 

 by Campbirds, several being youngsters 

 of the year, their bluish bills and darker 

 heads pointing unmistakably to immatur- 



bird (or these two birds?) hopped boldly 

 along the ground, or on the log, and fear- 

 lessly took meat from the outstretched 

 hand, and, with the second piece proffered, 

 tugged hard while I mischievously held 

 it fast. I have never seen them disagree- 

 able to each other; they always impress 

 me as jokers, deceiving their bird neigh- 

 bors by imitating perfectly a Hawk's 

 scream, or other birds' songs. They are 

 always good company, and greet one at 

 each new camp as though they were the 

 ones just left at the old camp. One of my 

 camping companions always said to them, 

 as they appeared when we unpacked and 

 were making a new camp "Hello! Got 

 here ahead of us, did you?" I never tire 

 of watching their adroitness at 'lifting' 

 an unguarded bit of food. The Colorado 

 bird is just as facile in spearing a chunk of 

 butter as is his Canada cousin in carrjdng 

 off a biscuit almost as large as himself. 

 One of the pleasantest recollections of 

 many camps in high altitudes, is that of a 

 Campbird uttering his delightful whisper 

 song, while perched on the tip of a tall 



