PROVIDE NESTING BOXES 39 



ficial and should be protected. If farm buildings 

 have sufficiently large openings, the barn owl will enter 

 and look after the mice. I suggest that experiments be 

 made with nesting boxes for them. The boxes should 

 vary in size from 16 x 12 x 12 to 18 x 14 x 14. Use 

 some with large side opening and leave the others en- 

 tirely open at the top and observe the results. The 

 boxes should be fastened in crotches of trees. Bore a 

 few small holes into the bottom of the open boxes, so 

 that rain water will not accumulate in them. 



9. The Wood Duck. This most beautiful and inter- 

 esting of all ducks has much decreased in Minnesota, 

 and no doubt in all settled districts. Even where the 

 lakes still ripple and plash in the June breeze, its 

 natural homes, the old and hollow trees, are gone. The 

 farmers have cut them for fuel, or some individual, who 

 styles himself hunter or trapper, has burned and cut the 

 hoary sires of the primeval forest, because a poor squir- 

 rel, or a cottontail, or even a coon had taken refuge in 

 them. 



Boxes having the natural bark on them, will un- 

 doubtedly attract the wood duck. Make the boxes about 

 24 x 16 x 16 to 36 x 18 x 18. They may be provided 

 with side openings of 4 to 5 inches diameter, or the top 

 may be left open. According to Masefield, an English 

 writer, such boxes have long been used in Lapland. 

 Place the boxes on trees in well-wooded places near 

 rivers and lakes. Wood ducks frequently build in 

 convenient crotches and on stumps. I would, therefore, 

 suggest that some very shallow boxes be also used. 



