FRIENDS IN FEATHERS 



noticed how she protected the birds; how often and proudly she 

 called the attention of visitors to the beauty, activity, and musi- 

 cal ability of her tiny tenants, so I came to realize that her threat 

 to nail the hole shut was caused by momentary annoyance; 

 if anyone really had driven away the Wrens, there would have 

 been serious trouble at our house. 



Any knot-hole around a house, or outbuilding, or small hollow 

 in a tree, any kind of box you could mention, tin can, or gourd, 

 will serve them. They will fill a box designed for Bluebirds 

 with twigs one never would imagine they could carry, build their 

 snug, soft nest of feather-lined grass and then wall up the large 

 opening with protruding twigs until neither Bluebird nor Sparrow 

 can force entrance. Householders often tell each other of the 

 queer places in which they have found Wren nests. Quite the 

 most peculiar of my experience was a sprinkling can. A woman 

 I knew inverted it in the crotch of a tree to drain after watering 

 her flowers. When she next wanted the can, she found it filled 

 with twigs, perfectly full, and occupied by a Wren, so she wired 

 it in its position and bought a new sprinkler. A man once told 

 me of forgetting his coat hanging over a fence rider and finding a 

 Wren nest in the pocket when he went to bring it, the following 

 day. 



The only nest I ever reproduced of hundreds that have sur- 

 rounded my habitation all my life, was in a section of hollow tree 

 I had set up on our grape-arbour for Bluebirds. The place 

 abounded in boxes especially designed for Wrens, but each year, 

 straight to the Bluebird box went the first pair, leaving the Wren 

 boxes for those coming later. So one year, before their arrival, 

 I set up the Bluebird box and wired it in place, instead of nailing, 

 lightly fastening the roof. When I felt by the best count I could 

 keep that the hen had finished laying and was brooding, I care- 

 fully lifted down the box while she was from home, and removed 



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