FIELD AND STUDY 



tect. Its nest is massive for so small a body — thick, 

 compact, smooth, soft, deep, and securely held in 

 the small forks of an upper branch. Much thistle- 

 down is ordinarily used in its construction. 



The chipping sparrow is a poor nest-builder com- 

 pared with either of the foregoing birds. Her nest is 

 loosely woven of small sticks and straws, and is 

 rarely well-secured to the branches. The sudden 

 summer gusts of rain and wind wreck more chippies' 

 nests than those of any other tree-builders. 



The kingbird is a harsh-voiced and harsh-man- 

 nered bird, and its nest of crabbed rootlets and 

 sticks and straws is in keeping. 



A few weeks later in the season I had a curious, 

 but at first rather painful, experience with the gold- 

 finch's nest. The nest was remarkably well hidden, 

 and the parent birds were so cunning that with all 

 my watching from my hammock a few yards away 

 I never once saw either of them near the nest. Fi- 

 nally in August I concluded that the nest was not 

 occupied, and I did what I rarely do with a bird's 

 nest, I proceeded to "collect" it. With a long pole 

 I lifted it from out the forked branch that held it, 

 and after considerable engineering, caused it to 

 fall to the ground. As it did so, to my dismay, a 

 young bird fell from the nest and struck the stub- 

 bled groimd heavily. The nest landed bottom side 

 up. Turning it over, I was shocked to find three 

 young birds nearly half grown, wedged into the 



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