196 STORIES OF BIED LIFE 



spring sun to hatch them. A dozen or more birds are thus 

 often found together. 



They form a merry company, these 

 little forest rangers, and never lack for 

 music as they march. The shrill piping 

 petOj petOj peto of the titmouse mingles 

 with the tenor drum tap, tap of Downy 's bill on the bark, 

 while ever and again the chickadee, a mere bundle of 

 nerves and fluffy feathers, ' ^ merrily sings his chick-a-dee- 

 dee/' 



Not merely for company do these birds thus associate, 

 but for mutual protection as well. Twenty pairs of sharp 

 eyes are more likely to see an enemy approaching than is 

 a single pair, and it is well for a small bird to keep a sharp 

 lookout at this season of the year, for it is more readily 

 seen by a hawk in a leafless winter wood than it is in a 

 shady summer forest. 



Like all other woodpeckers. Downy 's mate lays white 

 eggs. These are usually four or five in number, and are 

 placed on a bed of fine chips at the bottom of a hole, which 

 both parents have helped to dig, usually in the under side 

 of some decayed limb of a tree. Nature is not prone to 

 use her coloring matter on eggs which, like the woodpeck- 

 ers', are hid away in dark holes in trees. When the little 

 ones are hatched. Downy and his mate are kept very busy 



