218 Wild Bird Guests 



of many kinds, woolen yarn, silk thread, horse 

 hair, sheep's wool, feathers of domestic poultry, 

 rags, cotton batting, wood shavings, paper, and 

 probably other things. Any or all of these might 

 be offered with a fair chance of their being used. 

 Small dry twigs, and hay in convenient lengths, 

 would doubtless be accepted by certain birds, 

 and by a study of the nests in any locality, 

 probably other materials could be added to the 

 list. 



A puddle with plenty of soft wet clay or sticky 

 mud of some kind, or a tray of this material, in 

 an exposed situation, would be likely to be visited 

 by barn swallows and cliff swallows. 



One objection to offering the birds such mate- 

 rials as rags, cotton batting, paper, and shavings, 

 is that they are blown about by the wind and 

 make a garden look untidy. Perhaps this objec- 

 tion might be overcome by putting the materials 

 .in net bags with a wide mesh or in shallow 

 baskets or boxes with covers of netting and 

 painted so that they are inconspicuous when 

 placed on trees or in shrubbery. 



