8 



Nuts. 



Chickadees, nuthatches and many other birds are fond of 

 nut meats. Robert Ridgway, the eminent ornithologist of the 

 Smithsonian Institution, writing of conditions about his home 

 in southern Illinois, where 38 species of birds winter, said that 

 the favorite food was native nuts, including black walnuts, 

 hickory, pecan and butternuts, in the order named, and that so 

 long as these were provided and cracked, the birds would eat 

 nothing else put out for them, even English walnuts and pea- 

 nuts being discarded when they could get native nuts.^ In 

 New England the kernel of the butternut is a favorite food; 

 unroasted peanuts' are eaten by several species, and even the 

 cocoanut is not disdained by some. Walnuts, chestnuts, beech- 

 nuts or native nuts of any kind are useful. Nuts are rather 

 expensive food for birds, and certain acorns might be gathered 

 in autumn, cracked, ground and substituted for nuts. 



Fruit. 



Dried currants, blueberries, raspberries, raisins and figs have 

 been used to attract fruit-eating birds. Many birds eat frosted 

 apples or crab apples in winter. Any of the wdld summer fruits 

 attractive to birds may be saved and dried for winter use, or 

 w^ild fruits that remain on the stem in winter may be gathered 

 for the food tables. (See Circular No. 13, published by the 

 Massachusetts State Department of Agriculture.) 



Animal Food. 



Boiled eggs or their shells, refuse bones from the table, mar- 

 rowbones cracked open so that the birds may get at the marrow, 

 the bony framework of a cooked fowl, or the bones of a fish 

 offer good pickings for insectivorous birds in winter. The fatty 

 trimmings of beef, pork or mutton, pork rind, suet, lard or por- 

 tions of the carcasses of animals rarely or never used for human 

 food, such as skunks, muskrats, weasels, cats, etc., may be 

 utilized in providing animal food in winter, when birds most 

 need it. Cottage cheese is an excellent food that is relished 

 more than meat or fat by some insectivorous birds. Mrs. 

 E. O. Marshall writes that many birds show a marked pref- 

 erence for cheese curds. 



I "Bird-Lore," Vol. XVII., No. 2, March-April, 1915, p. 102. 



