CHAPTER III 

 EXCAVATORS AND MINERS 



OTHER ANIMALS 



Bird excavators Sand martins Delicate labourers Prodigious industry 

 The kingfisher A nest of bones Tortuous burrows An un- 

 mistakable dwelling A dying race Larks and their nests Ostriches 

 and their relations Kiwis ** Sniffing" for worms A remarkable egg 

 Tortoises Strange use for a tail Depositing the eggs Interesting 

 behaviour "Robber-crabs" A Munchausen-like story Crab and 

 cocoa-nut The underground bed Ghoulish habits Fiddler-crabs 

 Laughable antics Swift land-crabs Warning to trespassers A 

 mile of crabs Floods caused by cray-fish Tarantulas A well- 

 planned den The spider's tower Spider-eating sheep A brooding 

 spider. 



WE will now turn our attention to the birds, amongst 

 which excavators are no less numerous than in the 

 great division of the animal kingdom which we 

 have already considered. 



Some birds make tunnels of such great length that they 

 may very well be counted amongst the miners. The most 

 notable example of these in our own country is the Sand 

 Martin (Cotile riparia\ which comes to us early in the spring 

 from Africa, and lives in companies or colonies wherever it 

 finds a steep or overhanging bank of sand, as in ballast-pits, 

 beside rivers, and so forth, wherein to tunnel. 



It is not easy to understand how so small and delicate a 

 bird manages in a short time to sink a shaft of the relatively 

 enormous dimensions of some of those in which the sand 



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