38 



BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



ledge are very good things to begin with ; but 

 all bird-protectors at least should get beyond 

 this elementary stage, and consider the proper 

 food for various birds and the best method of 

 supplying it. Bread-crumbs may well be varied 

 with meat-scraps even for Robins, and sopped 

 bread-pieces are in many cases better than 

 crumbs, particularly when water as well as food 

 is scarce. 



The cocoa-nut for the Tit family has become 

 fairly popular ; it is easily procured, and easily 

 hung up — either entire, with a hole bored at 

 one end, or in half — from the branch of a tree 

 or from a verandah or other support ; and much 

 amusement may be derived from watching the 

 entertaining guests hanging on acrobatically to 

 string or nut and peck-pecking with fierce intent- 

 ness. This is a pretty sight that may be enjoyed 

 by London residents even on the confines of 

 the four-mile radius. 



Last winter a correspondent wrote from near 

 Rotherham : " During this winter I have noticed 

 quite a number of Blue Tits in my garden, and 

 have fed them on cocoa-nuts, giving them two 

 each week ; the nuts have cost only a penny 

 each this season, so it has been a cheap food for 

 them. I hang the nuts on a tree about 1 2 ft. 

 from the ground, and on a slender branch, so 

 that if the sparrows alight on them they rock 

 about and fly off at once." The nuts are 

 commonly suspended by a string with the like 

 object ; but the House-Sparrow can turn acro- 

 bat on occasion. Cocoanut shells also form a 

 useful cup to fill with other foods, such as pieces 

 of soft bread, or fat (melted fat poured in when 

 hot is better still), or a stiff pudding of meal, 

 unused porridge for example. Walnut shells 

 may be used in a similar fashion. Lumps of 

 fat and suet or bones can be hung up in like 

 fashion, and a string-net will serve to contain the 

 scraps and to prevent the birds from carrying 

 off too much at a time. Waste from meat is 

 always welcome to the birds, even bacon-rind 

 being by no means despised, for most species 

 share Mrs. Jack Spratt's tastes. All that remains 

 in the vegetable dishes will also be acceptable, 

 unless perhaps carrot, which no wild bird appears 

 to like. Boiled potato-peelings are an economic 



provision, and if the potatoes are boiled or baked 

 in their jackets, as they ought to be, the cast-off 

 skins will furnish a feast. A recipe or two from 

 Dr. Jessopp's charming booklet "Pity the Poor 

 Birds," are given in the Society's leaflet (No. n) 

 " Bird Food in Winter." 



Sunflower-heads should always be saved for 

 winter dinners — they are specially appreciated ; 

 decaying apples or pears, currants, and other 

 fruit, and nuts for nuthatches, help out the 

 menu. Considering how greedily human hands 

 appropriate, either for food or decoration, the 

 hedge-fruits which constitute the birds' chief 

 winter sustenance, it is not asking much to 

 suggest some little outlay in seeds (rape and 

 hemp particularly), nuts, damaged fruit, and 

 meal, as a small quid pro quo for starving 

 feathered folk at our door. 



Comparatively few species will venture to a 

 window-ledge. Scraps thrown on the ground, 

 together with the birds that flock to it, naturally 

 attract the prowling cat ; or the food is speedily 

 frozen, or buried in snow. Therefore the birds 

 should have a table as well as provender. An 

 upright post, or piece of gas-piping, with a wooden 

 tray fixed on the top, answers this purpose ; 

 it should be high enough to escape the cat, and 

 firmly planted ; there should be a ledge round 

 to keep the food on, and it should slope a little, 

 so that rain may run down. Some bird-friends 

 cover the table at the height of the inch-high 

 rim with a wide-meshed wire netting ; or, if 

 specially made, a grooved board is recom- 

 mended. A hole in which to sink a small 

 vessel (such as a flower-pot saucer) of water is 

 desirable, and a large hole may receive the 

 meat-dish. For the sake of the wilder birds the 

 table should not be too near the house, nor 

 where people are constantly passing to and fro ; 

 but it provides a wonderful opportunity for 

 studying and in time taming the hungry visitors. 



In Germany ingenious food-boxes are pro- 

 vided, from which grain, etc., dribbles auto- 

 matically on to the little tray below. In kindly 

 Norway a sheaf of corn is regularly set apart 

 for the birds, and hoisted on a long pole to 

 attract them. The late Mr. A. F. Wiener, a 

 Fellow of this Society, once recounted in a 



