152 



The Bird 



deposited their eggs. For hundreds of yards everv- thorny 

 bush is packed full of cup-shaped nests, even the spaces 

 between the nests ],eing often filled up with sticks or 

 rubbish, through whicli narrow i)assages are left for the 

 ingress and egress of the birds. Many starlings that can 

 find no room in the bushes build on the ground, or under 



Fig. lis. — Brown Pelicans divino; for fish. (San!)orn, photographer. Courtesy 



N. Y. Zoological Society.) 



stones, or in holes, and these unfortunates, together with 

 their eggs or young, ultimately become the victims of 

 the smaller carnivorous mammals or of snakes. It fre- 

 quent 1}' happens also that either the 3'oung locusts are 

 hatched in insufficient numbers or that they migrate before 

 the young starlings are fledged. In either case large 

 numbers of birds perish of himger, the majority of the 



