How to Attract the Birds 



windy or rainy for the moths to fly. The coral 

 honeysuckle's nectar cannot easily be reached by 

 bees ; its trumpets could not be seen after dark by the 

 moths ; moreover, it has no fragrance to guide them, 



but it pleases the ruby-throat 

 in every essential respect. 



What is the next flower 

 to spread his feast ? With a 

 broader and more northerly 

 range than the coral honey- 

 suckle's, the painted-cup or 

 Indian paint-brush scatters its 

 vivid scarlet tufts through the 

 fresh green grass on meadow 

 and prairie in May, its bloom- 

 ing season extending to July. 

 Usually the first humming- 

 bird of the season is seen 

 suspended as if by magic over 



these glowing flakes of fire. In this species not the 

 flowers themselves for they are greenish yellow 

 but the floral bracts which enfold them are ver- 

 milion advertisements to catch the ruby-throat's eye. 

 Other members of the figwort family, to which the 

 painted-cup belongs, wear the bee's favourite colour 

 and have provided a landing place on their lower 

 lips for their benefactors ; but here, what would be 

 superfluous at the painted-cup's entrance, Nature has 

 eliminated. 



Closely following the painted-cup, and indeed 

 partly overlapping its season, comes the graceful, 

 swinging, rock-loving columbine. Inasmuch as 

 both these flowers rarely grow in the same 



