228 Birds of Buzzard's Roost 



"But most I prize past summer's prime, 

 When other's throats have ceased to chime, 



The faithful tree top strain; 

 No brilliant bursts our ears enthrall 



A prelude with a 'dying fall' 

 That soothes the summer pain." 



Miss Blanchan is right when she says : "Borders of woods, 

 roadside thickets, and even garden shrubbery with open pas- 

 ture lots for foraging grounds near by, are favorite haunts of 

 these birds, and that they return again and again to the same 

 favorite spot." At Somerleaze we have one of these "roadside 

 thickets" one that we commenced many years ago so that 

 we might have the wild flowers and birds. It contains about 

 fifteen acres and now is a very wild place. We have not been 

 disappointed, for it is a veritable home for the wild flowers and 

 birds. On the north side of it is a public highway and along 

 it the indigo birds are found year after year. I will not be dis- 

 appointed in finding them there in the years to come, nor will 

 my grandchildren, when I have done looking for and expecting 

 the return of the birds. 



It will be well with us if we protect these birds, for they 

 are most useful because of the fact .that their food consists of 

 small weed seeds and insects. Of nineteen examined by Pro- 

 fessor King, he found that two had eaten caterpillars ; one, two 

 beetles; one, a grasshopper; one, raspberries; one, elderber- 

 ries; and eighteen of them had eaten the seeds of various 

 weeds. Professor Forbes found that seventy-eight per cent, 

 of the food of some he examined was canker worms. He also 

 notes that they had eaten caterpillars, spring beetles, vine 

 chafers and snout beetles. 



