THRUSH COUSINS 



jaunty fashion, singing away as every happy little wren 

 should. They build a conspicuous globular nest sus- 

 pended well up among the reeds or rushes. Entrance 

 is by a little round hole in one side. The chamber is 

 softly lined with plant down, and rather late in June 

 contains from five to nine very dark little eggs of a 

 mahogany-brown color. A curious trait of this wren 

 is that it builds a number of dummy nests, apparently 

 to mislead intruders. One will often examine half a 

 dozen nests before the finished and occupied one is 

 found. 



The Short-billed Marsh Wren is similar in many of 

 its habits, but is even more secretive and mouse-like 

 than the other. It keeps more to low, thick meadow 

 grass, and builds a nest similar to that of the other, 

 but low down in a tussock. The equally numerous 

 eggs are, however, pure white. The sitting bird w T ill 

 sneak off the nest and be hiding in the grass close by, 

 despite all one's efforts to kick it out. I succeeded 

 once in getting a photograph of one near its nest in a 

 meadow by setting the camera focused on a nearby 

 bush on which I saw it several times alight. Standing 

 off in the distance, holding the thread connected with 

 the shutter, I had a friend chase the little rascal. It 

 took short flights from bush to bush, until once it 

 alighted just where I wanted it. Often it would get 

 just under the bush, and I would walk up and poke at 

 it with a switch to try to make it fly up higher. But. 

 instead it would run like a mouse off into the grass. 

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