ioo Wild Birds 



upright branch. But the same instinct may be observed at 

 other times when it is even more striking. I once moved a 

 nest of a pair of these birds and mounted it in front of a porch, 

 where it could be easily seen by all the members of my family. 

 While watching the feeding operations one day with a friend, 

 we walked leisurely towards the nest. To our great surprise 

 the old bird did not leave, but stood bolt upright on the main 

 branch, and with head up-turned awaited our coming. She 

 maintained this extraordinary attitude while we stood by at 

 a distance of a few feet and admired the exhibition. It could 

 not be denied that the olive -gray, rod-like body of this bird 

 might under other circumstances, as when surrounded bv 

 foliage, have been readily mistaken for a short stub or a trun- 

 cated branch of the tree. 



Another, and in many ways the most interesting, nest was 

 built in a pine, some account of which has already been given, 

 in illustrating the change of the nesting site. I watched these 

 birds over ten hours from the tent, saw a great many interesting 

 sights, and made a long series of pictures. 



The young at this nest were visited and fed forty-seven times 

 during an interval of exactly ten hours and forty -seven minutes, 

 on three different days. On the last day they were fed on the 

 average once in ten minutes. The food consisted of choke -cher- 

 ries and red bird-cherries, varied with raspberries, blackberries, 

 and blueberries, together with insects which, during the last days 

 of life at the nest, constituted about one quarter of the fare. At 

 one half the number of visits recorded, fruit alone was served. 

 From six to ten cherries were brought in the gullet at a time, 

 and once by count eleven blueberries. Feeding was effected 

 almost always by regurgitation in whole or part, and rarely 

 was any food visible when the birds came to the nest. Now 

 and then, however, a bird would approach loaded to the muzzle, 

 with a berry or insect in the bill to round out the measure. 

 Soft fruits like raspberries were crushed to a pulp, and insects, 

 which are commonly served with the berries, came up covered 

 with saliva, and often in an unrecognizable state. The staple 

 animal food was grasshoppers, and I have seen the large cicada 



