THE NUTHATCH. 815 



At any rate the owner of filbert trees where these birds 

 abound has need to keep a daily watch, or his share in the 

 produce will prove exceedingly small. I have seen trees 

 bearing a fine crop of husks but nearly all empty. The 

 proprietor had suffered them to remain till they were ripe, 

 the !N'uthatches had taken a different view of the case and 

 preferred them unripe rather than not at all. But what, 

 it may be asked, can a bird little larger than a Sparrow 

 find to do with a filbert, or even a hazel-nut *? Here we 

 have a fresh distinctive feature in the biography of the 

 Nuthatch. The bird carries off its prey in its beak, and 

 when in want of a meal wedges the nut in the crevice 

 of some rough-barked tree, such as an oak, an elm, or a 

 walnut. This done, he takes his stand, head downwards, 

 above the nut, throws back his head to gather force for a 

 blow, and then brings it violently forwards many times in 

 rapid succession, aided, too, by the weight of his body and 

 a clapping of the wings in exact time with each stroke. 

 By dint of repeated blows thus dealt by his strong beak, 

 even the hard shell of a filbert at last gives way ; a small 

 hole is the result, which is soon enlarged, and the kernel 

 becomes the hardly-earned prize. My readers must not 

 suppose this an imaginary scene, though new to them. 

 Any one who will take the trouble to examine the 

 trunks of old oaks and elms will be sure to find shells 

 still remaining wedged into the bark, and if during a 

 ramble in the woods in autumn or winter, or even in 

 early spring, he should happen to hear a smart tapping, 

 let him follow the direction of the sound, and he will 

 stand a fair chance of discovering the clever httle nut- 

 cracker at work. If in the course of his operations the 

 bird happens to dislodge a nut, so nimble is he that before 

 it reaches the ground he will have caught it in his beak.* 

 Acorns and the nuts of yew-berries, and probably other 



* See an amusing accoxint of the Nuthatch in the Zoologist^ 

 vol. i. p. 213. 



