276 THE NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [i, 6, nov. 1905 



Birds Eating Butterflies. In regard to the matter of birds eating 

 butterflies mentioned in the September issue it might be well to put 

 my experience on record. In 1898 I spent two weeks at a country 

 place upon the veranda of which a phoebe-bird had built her nest. in 

 plain view. At the time of my visit there were four fledgelings in the 

 nest and these the mother bird fed principally on butterflies. This is 

 not a mere matter of recollection for I wrote down the occurrence at 

 the time. What made the incident especially strikinig' was the fact 

 that the old bird did not quite kill the butterflies nor remove their 

 wings and as a result we were often treated to the sight of a young 

 bird holding a butterfly whose wings were still waving desperately. 

 After the butterflies had ceased to struggle, the young birds often 

 sat for some time with a butterfly's wing projecting from each side of 

 its bill. The butterflies were the common yellow and white ones so 

 common over grass fields, cabbage patches and along roadsides. If 

 one were to try to decide whether this is a common occurrence, I 

 think it would be well to watch only certain birds such as the fly- 

 catchers and their kin. To me it seems likely that strictly insectivo- 

 rous birds may capture a large number of butterflies each season. 



WiLLARD N. ClUTE. 



Vitality of Seeds. Twenty-five years ago Professor Beal, of Mich- 

 igan Agricultural College, placed seeds of twenty-three kinds of plants 

 in moist sand in uncorked bottles planted, mouth downward, twenty 

 inches deep in a sandy hillside. Some seeds of each kind were tested 

 quinquennially. All acorns were dead in two years. Eight kinds 

 failed to germinate at the end of five years and thereafter. Eleven 

 germinated after twenty-five years. Among them were black mus- 

 tard, shepherd's purse, evening primrose, curled dock and common 

 purslane. — Botanical Gazette. 



Cock-spur Thorn. Dr. Leavitt, writing in the October Plant 

 World, states that the great majority of the thorns of Crataegus Crus- 

 galli point downward or curve downward. His interpretation of the 

 usefulness of these peculiar modified branches is that they are de- 

 fences against animals — ox and deer families — which now or once fed 

 upon the leaves. The downward-pointing thorns are supposed to be 

 especially valuable because these animals commonly seize branches 

 from beneath. This explanation seems almost too perfect to be true. 

 No doubt the trees are well defended by the thorns as arranged, but 

 some biologists will doubt whether the relation between the plants and 

 the animals is intimate enough to be of great moment in preserving 

 the thorn-tree in the struggle for existence in the past. An explana- 

 tion which appeals to many is that the thorns arose originally as a 



