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IN NATURE'S WAYS 



watch a squirrel sitting up on his haunches, grasping a 

 nut in his little front paws, and holding it to his mouth 

 as he gnaws away an opening. Mice gnaw a similar 

 kind of hole. You could not mistake a nut opened by 

 a mouse for one opened by a nuthatch, for you can 



see the little teeth-marks of the mouse all round the 

 edge of the opening. 



Another lover of nuts there is whose work is known 

 at once the nut-weevil. When you find an almost 

 empty nutshell with a minute round hole you know 

 the nut-weevil has emerged therefrom. He is the 

 neatest of all artists in opening nuts, and by his work 

 causes many disappointments to nuthatches. 



The nut-weevil is the larva, or maggot, of a black 



