44 Birds of Lakeside and Prairie 



friend, the black-cap chickadee, who does his best to save our 

 Northern winters from dreariness, I confess that I think Cousin 

 Peter is of the more interesting habit. 



A woodpecker note that was new made me ask our driver 

 to stop once more. An orange-pated bird scuttled around 

 the trunk of a tree. Here was another discovery. It was 

 the red-bellied woodpecker, common enough in this locality, 

 but hitherto a stranger to the visiting observers. This wood- 

 pecker has been getting himself much disliked in recent years. 

 It is not at all an uncommon bird in Florida, and there the 

 orange-growers say that it attacks and ruins the fruit. Bird- 

 lovers, the country over, are hoping that it will be proved that 

 the bird selects only the unsound oranges for probing. Since 

 it has been fairly well established that the kingbird, which 

 was supposed to be a great destroyer of honey-bees, eats only 

 the worthless drones, the red-bellied woodpecker's friends 

 hope that a parallel excuse may be found for its conduct. 



We drove under a tree whose branches roofed the road. 

 It was filled with red-winged blackbirds. They were all 

 males, and as they shifted uneasily from twig to twig, they 

 showed to advantage their shoulder-knots of scarlet and gold. 

 It was a noisy flock, but in the spring every bird-note has in 

 it something of softness. Our driver host told us that the 

 redwings were abundant in spring and fall, but that they did 

 not nest anywhere in the vicinity. This statement struck me 

 as being curious, for on every side were places which seemed 

 to be ideal for the purposes of blackbird housekeeping. 

 Beyond the blackbird tree we saw our first meadowlark. He 

 was full of the joy of living, and was trying his best to tell 

 the listening world about it from the top of a fence-post. 

 We drove past the bird without causing him to leave his perch. 



