BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



83 



NESTING AND FEEDING BOXES 

 FOR BIRDS. 



The demand for the Society's Nesting-Boxes was 

 so large last spring as not a little to disconcert 

 arrangements that had been made chiefly with 

 the idea of providing specimen boxes for those 

 bird-lovers who wished to have an example in the 

 concrete to show to a local carpenter or an 

 ingenious lad. Simple as they are, however, it 

 would seem that the boxes are more readily and 

 satisfactorily contrived by practised hands, though 

 it is hoped that the local making of them, thus 

 saving carriage, will be encouraged. Such boxes 

 are, as is well known, extensively used on the 

 Continent and in the United States, and there, 

 where birds have apparently become accustomed 

 to this style of ready-made dwelling, more fanciful 

 patterns are often employed than would be prudent 

 in the United Kingdom with us ; the Berlepsch and 

 (if the liberty of so christening them be per- 

 mitted) " Masefield " patterns are most successful. 

 Hungarians, who note the English adoption of 

 Nesting-Boxes, and also of Bird and Tree Day, are 

 proposing to provide boxes in the State forests, and 

 it is to be hoped that British Park and Woods and 

 Forests authorities will one day make similar 

 provision in public pleasure grounds to compensate 

 the birds for the loss of nesting-holes and hollow 

 trees. 



Feeding-tables and shelters for the birds are 

 another feature in Germany and Austria, which 

 seems likely to find more and more imitators in 

 Britain. The birds are being robbed of their 

 hedge-fruit ; their consumption of ornamental or 

 edible berries in the garden is the theme of endless 

 newspaper letters ; and yet the household scraps, 

 on which they might fare sumptuously, are too 

 often thrown into the fire or dust-bin. Many people 

 now find entertainment in the provision of cocoa- 

 nuts or string-bags of suet for the lively Tits ; and 

 kindly people have always thrown out crumbs for 

 the finches. But crumbs and other scraps on the 

 ground have the drawbacks of getting covered 

 with snow and of attracting the cats. A bird-table 

 is more satisfactory in a garden ; and some 

 ingenious little food-cases for fixing to bush or 

 window-sill are used in Germany and Switzerland, 

 specimens of which have been imported by the 

 R.S.P.B. In those bird-fostering lands, bird-food 

 is sold for use in these and larger "automatic" 

 feeders. Nor is the matter left entirely to private 

 benevolence, the State and the civic authorities 



providing shelters and food in royal and town 

 parks. " In the parks at Munich," writes Miss 

 Octavia Paterson, who has recently visited that 

 town, " they place trays on poles, in the parks ; the 

 long pole comes up through the tray, and fir 

 branches are arranged at the top of it to form 

 a sort of umbrella, over the tray, to protect the 

 food from rain and snow. This has induced 

 the birds to remain more in the town instead of 

 migrating." 



The Berlepsch automatic feeder for birds is 

 sold at a price which would be considered 

 prohibitive in England, but some combination 

 of shelter and food-stand is very desirable, and 

 the week's store of food is useful when it is wished 

 to feed birds out in the country, where shy species 

 linger and have no friends. Miss Paterson 

 describes one shelter used by her friends in 

 Austria, which some of our readers might like to 



AN AUSTRIAN FOOD-SHELTER FOR BIRDS. 



imitate. It consists of a tray some eighteen inches 

 square, fixed on to a pole. On the tray, leaving a 

 margin or terrace a few inches wide, is a little 

 house, a sort of Noah's Ark, with an open door at 

 at each side and end gables also open. The roof 

 is made very slanting and covered with bark, and 

 a branch or two of fir at each end makes the place 

 more inviting. Food is of course placed inside. 

 Any old box with top and bottom removed and 

 doors cut on all sides, can be fastened on a tray to 

 make this food-house, two small boards joined 

 together at the angle required being nailed on for 

 roof. English birds might be shy of such a house 

 at first, but if fixed in a quiet place and regularly 

 supplied with food, it would probably soon be a 

 centre of attraction. 



