Birds of the Snow 



[FIRST WEEK 



j uncos are heard before the ice begins to form, and they 

 stay with us all winter. 



We have called the junco a snowbird, but this name 

 should really be confined to a black and white bunting 

 which comes south only with a mid-winter's rush of snow- 

 flakes. Their warm little bodies nestle close to the white 



crystals, and they seek 

 cheerfully for the seeds 

 which nature has provided 

 for them. Then a thaw 

 comes, and they disappear 

 as silently and mysteri- 

 ously as if they had melted 

 with the flakes ; but doubt- 

 less they are far to the 

 northward, hanging on the 

 outskirts of the Arctic 

 storms, and giving way 

 only when every particle 

 of food is frozen tight, the 

 ground covered deep with 

 snow, and the panicled 

 seed clusters locked in 

 crystal frames of ice. 



The feathers of these Arctic wanderers are perfect 

 non-conductors of heat and of cold, and never a chill 

 reaches their little frames until hunger presses. Then they 

 must find food and quickly, or they die. When these 

 snowflakes first come to us they are tinged with gray and 

 brown, but gradually through the winter their colours 



RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH 



