54 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



partments, each about eight inches square and six inches high inside, with 

 an opening two inches wide, in this case near the bottom of each section, 

 and a ledge or doorstep for the birds to occupy. The martins are nearly 

 as well satisfied with a starch box which has been divided into compart- 

 ments and covered with a roof as they are with the elaborately constructed 

 martin boxes described in the bird magazines. Martin houses should be 

 erected on poles in the garden or back yard at a height of from ten to fifteen 

 feet, the box so mounted on the top of the pole that marauding cats can 

 not disturb it and with removable front, if possible, so that the boxes may 

 be cleaned each spring just before the martins arrive in April, and prefer- 

 ably should be closed during the winter to keep the English sparrows from 

 occupying them, and opened just before the time of the Martin's arrival 

 from the South. If martin houses were erected in all our villages and 

 cities and even about many farmyards, this interesting and extremely 

 beneficial bird might be preserved; but we can scarcely hope that it will 

 remain a common species in any locality without special protection from 

 the English sparrow, and unless it is furnished with suitable houses for 

 shelter and nesting. 



The progressive decline of all woodpeckers in the agricultural districts 

 leads us to suggest that unless nesting limbs are provided for these species 

 as well as for nuthatches, chickadees, Crested flycatchers, Tree swallows, 

 and all those birds which nest in hollows, they will continue to decline ; but 

 if nesting limbs are provided they will undoubtedly, to a certain extent, 

 be tided over the most difficult stage in adapting themselves to culture 

 conditions and will finally become established among our orchards and shade 

 trees. At least, this would certainly be the result with the Flicker, Downy 

 woodpecker, Chickadee and Nuthatch and probably the Crested fly- 

 catcher. Likewise, the Red-headed woodpecker and Hairy woodpecker 

 might occasionally avail themselves of the artificial sites and so be estab- 

 lished in localities where dead and hollow limbs have all been cut away to 

 improve the parks and shade trees. These limbs for woodpeckers, in the 

 author's estimation, should be at least two feet in length, and for the 



