16 



JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



beside the house. Doubtless the same 

 pair that nested in the apple tree in the 

 same yard the year before. We watched 

 this pair with much interest from the 

 time they gave evidence of building to 

 the time they with their young joined 

 others in the early autumn. As much 

 time as possible was spent in 

 watching them choosing a nesting 

 site, feeding about the garden, and 

 also eluding a neighbor's cat that 

 often came into the yard and tried to 

 catch them as they hopped along the 

 ground, searching for the earth and cut- 

 worms. (Let me say that a neighborly 

 cat came in search of my Robins once 

 too many times, and lost her noble life 

 by a small ritle ball that dropped gently 

 from a window, and made but a slight 

 noise, yet had the desired effect.) These 

 birds feed largely on the earth worms 

 and cut-worms that were very plenty in 

 our garden. They would hop along a 

 few steps and stop and listen for a mo- 

 ment, sometimes with their heads 

 twisted to one side in a listening atti- 

 tude, then suddenly they would dart 

 forward and make a sudden thrust into 

 the ground with their beak, and swallow 

 an earth worm quickly. Often they fed 

 on the cut-worms that I would turn out 

 while working in the garden, and the 

 quantity that they would pick up was 

 really surprising. They would hop 

 about, not seeming to mind my presence, 

 and gather the worms with surprising 

 rapidity, occasionally changing the hop 

 with both feet to a run for a short dis- 

 tance, their feet flying very fast, much 

 like the manner of the Grass Finch as it 

 runs along the roads in August. The 

 good done in our garden by this one pair 

 of birds we estimated to be very great. 

 The agriculturalist and fruit grower 



would do well to study their best friends 

 and helpers before they shoot them for 

 taking a few cherries and small fi'iiit, 

 for they have well earned all the fruit 

 they take. 



I did not see the Bluebird in the Bax- 

 ter woods until April 29th. I saw them 

 in small flocks in my early morning 

 walks in May, also in the fall as I rode 

 out into the country on my wheel. One 

 little characteristic I have often noticed : 

 it is that when alighting on a twig or a 

 fence, or wherever it alights, as it set- 

 tles on its perch it throws up one of its 

 wings nervously with one or two flutters 

 as though to catch its balance. It is a 

 small char:icteristic, but will help one to 

 know the bird when it alights too far 

 away to identify it by its form or color. 



Of the Swallows, the Barn, Cliff, White 

 bellied, and Bank Swallows, also the Pur- 

 ple Martin were observed. The Barn 

 Swallow was first seen April 29th. It used 

 to be a very abundant bird in Farming- 

 ton six or seven years ago. There were 

 six or seven barns that I was familiar 

 with the number of Swallows breeding 

 therein. This year on my vacation one 

 of the first observations I made w:is the 

 scarcity of the Barn Swallows that used 

 to skim over the fields and pastures feed- 

 ing on the insect life that they catch so 

 skillfully and devour while on the wing. 

 Very few were seen during my stay 

 there, and the fields and meadows 

 seemed very incomplete without the 

 quantities of Swallows darting here and 

 there. On visiting the barns above men- 

 tioned, in one where last year there Avere 

 four occupied nests, only one was occu- 

 pied. I have known the history of this 

 barn since it was built and a little odd to 

 say, this one nest occupied was the 



