124 



NATURE'S CALENDAR 



Tyjjg . the summer— as early as possible, in fact 



• — for their home-making, instead of a 



later, warmer season? Plainly, in order 

 to have time to rear their young into the 

 strength enabling them to travel south- 

 ward, if they be migratory in habit, or to 

 endure the winter, if they remain with us 

 the year round. Moreover, it is in May 

 and June, more than later in the sum- 

 mer, that proper food for the young can 

 be obtained. This consists almost wholly 

 of worms, and the larvae of insects, cater- 

 pillars, grubs, etc. Seed-eating birds, as 

 well as the insect-killing ones, must hav^e 

 this sort of food for their fledgelings, and 

 must obtain it in great quantities; hence 

 they must hatch their eggs at the season 

 when young insects most abound. 



In view of this fact, it will be proper for 

 us to describe briefly the situation of the 

 nests of the birds more commonly to be 

 found now in the eastern United States. 



Both the cuckoos are nesting early in 

 the month, though the black -billed is 

 rather more hasty in beginning than the 

 yellow-billed. They build rude nests of 

 twigs, coarse weed -stems, pine-needles, 

 etc., and place them in low, dense trees, 

 like evergreens, usually close to the trunk. 

 All of the flycatchers, except the hardy 

 and hasty phoebe-bird, postpone their nid- 

 ification until June, and .present, in the 

 great variety of their nesting, an interest- 

 ing exception to the rule that birds nearly 

 related are similar in their architecture. 



