No. 4.] BIRDS AND WOODLANDS. 307 



span worms, disturbed by the movements of the caterpillar- 

 hunting warblers, vireos and sparrows among leaves and 

 twigs, spin down on their gossamer threads, and so escape 

 one enemy, they are marked by flycatchers sitting on the 

 watch or hovering in the air ready to dart upon them. When 

 the mature insects, gaining wings, attempt to escape by 

 flight, they are snapped up by these same flycatchers, which 

 sit waiting on the outer limbs of the trees; or, escaping 

 these, they are pursued by the swallows and swifts m the 

 upper air. Those whose flight is nocturnal must run the 

 gauntlet of the screech owl, night-hawk and whippoorwill. 

 Thus birds guard the trees as the summer wanes, until the 

 chill of autumn evenings causes the remaining insects to seek 

 winter hiding-places, and warns the birds to begin their 

 southward migrations. Then the tide of bird life turns back, 

 and, passing, leaves the wood in silence, except for the sigh- 

 ins: of the branches and the rustle of the falling leaves. In 

 October a few thrushes flit here and there, blue jays mourn- 

 fully call, a crow caws now and then, but otherwise the 

 woods seem deserted. Still, at this season of the year and 

 all through the winter and early spring months the few birds 

 which remain are accomplishing the greatest good for the 

 forest ; for now the development and increase of all insects 

 is arrested, while their destruction by birds goes on. An- 

 other point, — the winter birds must subsist largely on the 

 eggs of insects, for many insects pass the winter in that form 

 alone ; and the bird that eats these eggs can destroy a hun- 

 dred times as many insects in this minute, em])ryonic form, 

 as it could in the summer, after the caterpillars had hatched 

 and grown toward maturity. The jays, titmice, nuthatches 

 and woodpeckers, which remain through the winter in the 

 northern woods, must give at least six months more of service 

 to the trees in Massachusetts than the majority of birds that 

 come here as migrants, or as summer residents only. These 

 birds, with the creepers and kinglets, are especially the 

 guardians of the wood. Millions upon millions of insects 

 and their eggs are destroyed by them during the long winter 

 months. In this work they are assisted to some extent by 

 the winter finches and sparrows. 



The following notes from the pen of my friend and co- 



