RUFFLE-BREAST, THE SHRIKE 



UFFLE-BREAST was the name 

 given by some boys to a logger- 

 head shrike which lived a few 

 years ago about the fields and 

 orange groves of a small town in 

 Florida. The bir$ was so 

 called on account of the pecu- 

 liar appearance of its breast, 

 there being a row of feathers 

 across the front which ap- 

 peared to have grown in the 

 wrong direction, thus rendering it 

 impossible for the breast to be smooth 

 as in other birds. 



Our first acquaintance with Ruffle-Breast was made in 

 this way. A pair of shrikes one season built their nest in 

 the main fork of a small oak tree growing near one of the 

 public highways which led into the village. No one dis- 

 turbed the nest until the eggs were hatched and the young 

 had been fed for some time. One day a boy climbed into 



the tree to see the little birds. As he did so the nest seemed 



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