Correspondence.



125



THE CAMPBIRD.


The books call him the ‘ Rocky mountain jay,’ but he isn’t as much of a

‘ jay ’ as the long-crested chap, or any of his other relatives in Colorado. lie is

just a plain 1 Campbird.’ as full of curiosity, and with just as mighty an appetite,

as his first cousin in Canada, or the Adirondacks. Somehow or other, I don’t

like to hear him called a * Camp Robber,’ even if he is ever anxious to take

scraps where he can’t get everything else in sight. After all, he cannot side¬

track memories of long, cold, starvation winters, and can’t help trying to be

well supplied for the next to come : his body remembers if his mind does’nt.


Many years ago, while camping in our Rockies, I watched and fed for

several days a campbird which had lost one leg, and only this past summer I

saw and fed another which had lost nearly half of its lower mandible. Surely,

one must admire the grit and persistence exemplified in these two birds,

even though they may have been automatic in them. It’s hard enough in bird

world, to dodge all the hundred-and-one things which spell death, when one has

a complete equipment to battle with element and enemy, and we can never know

how much more difficult it must be, in the face of such physical disabilities, to

avoid being at once blotted out ; nevertheless, both of these birds were adults

and fat and vigorous. One wonders how such losses come about, for they are

not rare with birds, and evidently do not necessarily lead, in the struggle for

existence, to prompt death. Accidents in bird world must be many, and the

chances for their occurrence still larger, and it is probable that most do lead to

early death. I am glad to know, however, through personal knowledge, that

many birds survive physical injuries of considerable magnitude, and yet after¬

ward seem full of bird happiness and health. I once saw a robin strike against

a telegraph wire while in full flight, and stiU make off as if not disabled ; house

finches are frequently seen minus a foot or a leg, or with a foot or a leg crippled.

A flicker (woodpecker) was brought to me some time ago, one leg of which

had been broken, and healed at an angle of 90 degrees, without the deformity

affecting the activity or general condition of the bird. Birds are often caught

in deadfalls or steel traps, and in the latter I have found at different times,

eagles and 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 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

campbirds hard in their efforts to find food and keep warm. It is small

wonder that everyone 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



