Monthly Bulletin 5 



The Society welcomes these new members and will be glad to have 

 them make use of the office in all matters pertaining to bird study and bird 

 protection. 



ITEMS. 



Crackles nested in a bird-house of the type made by E. C. Ware of 

 Wareham in one of the Worcester city parks last year. The house was at 



the top of a flexible pole. 



* « * * ♦ 



The value of gulls as scavengers is shown in the fact that thousands 

 of them are reported to have worked all last winter for the health authori- 

 ties of Green Bay, Wisconsin, disposing of the waste from fisheries at the 

 rate of a wagon-load in three minutes. 



It may be that gulls are to be useful in detecting lurking submarines. 

 At least a Brooklyn inventor proposes their use for this. His plan is to 

 educate the gulls of our Atlantic seaboard by having submarines feed them 

 frequently at sea, both from the surface and by releasing floating food from 

 the depths. The gulls, thus learning that a submarine, when sighted above 

 water or below, means food for them will henceforth flock above any sub- 

 marine and thus reveal its presence. Gulls in their constant search for 

 floating food cover vast stretches of sea and can detect a submarine at a 

 considerable depth. It may be that with the geese that saved Rome will 

 some day be immortalized the gulls that saved the Allies from the German 

 menace, and it may be not. The idea is an interesting one, at any rate. 



AN INTERESTING ROBIN. 

 Editor, Bulletin: 



Dear Sir: — It may interest your readers to know that for three succes- 

 sive seasons I had about my home, 25 Bellevue Avenue, Melrose, a robin 

 which had had his toes on one foot entirely shot off", so that all he had was 

 about two inches of a straight leg. 



It was very comical to see him endeavor to pull earth worms out of 

 the ground, for the strnnp of his leg would slip into the soft dirt, and he 

 would tip way over on one side. 



We fed him continually, and I think that is the reason why he probably 

 stayed about the flower garden so closely. 



It is also rather interesting to note that for two years this robin raised 

 a family in a box we provided for him. 



Truly yours, 



Franklin P. Shumway. 



