JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



inorganic world, while the animal can 

 feed only on the product of lower life 

 that dies that the higher may live. 



Birds walk in life's procession next 

 above reptiles and next below mammals, 

 and they are no exception to the great 

 law just given, that animal life depends 

 on vegetable. Birds, therefore, are pre- 

 sent or absent, abundant or rare, accord- 

 ing to the variety of plant life that 

 abounds at any place or at any season. 



Not all birds, it is true, live directly 

 on vegetable food. Many are birds of 

 prey, living on other birds, or on the 

 smaller animals of different kinds, or on 

 the flesh of larger animals. A still larger 

 number are insectivorous, living on the 

 multifold forms of insect life ; flies, bugs, 

 beetles, grubs, moths, butterflies, that 

 swarm in earth and air. 



Many live on forms of life that abound 

 in water, or about the shores of ponds, 

 or in bogs ; on reptiles, small fishes, shell 

 fishes, worms and other forms of life. 

 But even these are no exception to the 

 law that the pyramid of life rests on the 

 plant as its basis and that birds abound 

 where the plant conditions are favorable 

 and are wanting where plant conditions 

 are hostile. 



The abundance of insect life depends 

 upon the presence of plant life. The 

 migrations of birds have their chief ex- 

 planation in this fact. Birds are bot- 

 anists because their very food depends 

 upon plants, and they come or go ac- 

 cording to the season, because their food 

 is plentiful or lacking as the season 

 changes. 



Birds are constantly subject to the 

 great struggle for existence and when 

 the conditions of living become too hard 

 for them in one place, it is not cowardice 

 but wisdom, the wisdom of necessity, 

 that bids them flee to another. 



They take refuge in flight. Many 

 more birds remain with us through the 

 winter than is usually supposed ; but 

 these are species that are able to adapt 

 themselves to the botanical conditions. 



They are winter botanists. To them 

 the year is a circle, a ring thinner indeed, 

 on its winter side, but still having many 

 forms of life, of seed, or bird, or hidden 

 chrysalis, on which they may make many 

 a dainty meal. One winter's day, when 

 the ground had been covered deep with 

 the newly fallen snow, after one of our 

 blustering snow-storms, I went down to 

 the banks of the Messalonskee and look- 

 ed across to the fields opposite and saw 

 that the winds had piled the snow up 

 around the shrubs and bushes where it 

 was needed to protect the roots from the 

 cold, and left bare the stalks of golden- 

 rod and other weeds in the more open 

 spaces, and that a flock of winter birds 

 was. flying cheerily about and feeding 

 upon the seeds left uncovered by the 

 snow. The very winds of winter had 

 swept the snow away and spread their 

 table for them. "Behold the birds of 

 the air, for they sow not, neither do they 

 reap, nor gather into barns, yet your 

 Heavenly Father feedeth them." 



There ai'e whole groups of birds which 

 feed directly upon the seeds of grasses 

 and sedges and other plants, and these 

 are of course botanists in the search and 

 selection of their food. The finches are 

 a good illustration of these birds. With 

 their stout, cone-shaped bills they can 

 crusli the capsules of seeds, and secure 

 their food from what w^ould seem most 

 unpromising sources. 



The thistle-finch perches daintily upon 

 the swaying thistle and pecks away the 

 ripe seeds for its food, and tears out the 

 down from this and perhaps other com- 

 posite floweis for its nest. The gros- 



