FAR AND NEAR 



In such places he may find dormant spiders and flies 

 and other hibernating insects or their larva?. We 

 have a tiny, mosquito-like creature that comes forth 

 in March or in midwinter, as soon as the temper- 

 ature is a little above freezing. One may see them 

 performing their fantastic air-dances when the air 

 is so chilly that one buttons his overcoat about him 

 in his w^alk. They are darker than the mosquito, — 

 a sort of dark water-color, — and are very frail to 

 the touch. Maybe the wTen knows the hiding-place 

 of these insects. 



With food in abundance, no doubt many more of 

 our birds w^ould brave the rigors of our winters. I 

 have known a pair of bluebirds to brave them on 

 such poor rations as are afforded by the hardback 

 or sugarberry, — a drupe the size of a small pea, w ith 

 a thin, sweet skin. Probably hardly one per cent, of 

 the drupe is digestible food. Bluebirds in December 

 will also eat the berries of the poison ivy, as will the 

 downy woodpecker. 



Robins will pass the winter with us when the cover 

 of a pine or hemlock forest can be had near a supply 

 of red cedar berries. The cedar-bird probably finds 

 little other food in the valley of the Hudson and in 

 New England, yet I see occasional flocks of them 

 every winter month. 



Sometimes the chickadees and nuthatches, hunt- 

 ing through the winter woods, make a discovery that 

 brings every bird within hearing to the spot, — they 



176 



