I40 Birds Every Child Should Know 



West, boldly perching upon their backs to 

 feed upon the insect parasites — a pleasant 

 visitor for the cows. So far, so good. 



The male is a shining, greenish-black bird^ 

 smaller than a robin, with a coffee-brown head 

 and neck. His morals are awful, for he makes 

 violent love to any brownish-gray cowbird 

 he fancies but mates with none. What should 

 be his song is a squeaking kluck tse-e-e, squeezed 

 out with difficulty, or a gurgle, like water being 

 poured from a bottle. When he goes a-wooing, 

 he behaves ridiculously, parading with spread 

 wings and tail and acting as if he were violently 

 nauseated in the presence of the lady. Fancy 

 a cousin of the musical bobolink behaving 

 so! 



And nothing good can be said for the female 

 cowbird. Shirking as she does every motherly 

 duty, she sneaks about the woods and thickets, 

 slyly watching her chance to lay an egg in the 

 cradle of some other bird, since she never makes 

 a nest of her own. Thus she scatters her prospec- 

 tive family throughout the neighbourhood. The 

 yellow warbler, who is a famous sufferer from 

 her visits, sometimes outwits her, as we have 

 seen ; but other warblers, less clever, the vireos, 

 some sparrows, and, more rarely, woodpeckers, 

 flycatchers, orioles, thrushes and wrens, seem 

 to accept the unwelcome gift without a protest. 

 If you were a bird so imposed upon, wouldn't 



