Ground and Underground Nests 



the work is abandoned, or the bird deviates from its usual 

 straight course in order to avoid the obstacle. The 

 burrow completed, a chamber is made at the terminus, and 

 in the chamber a nest of dried grass and feathers is built. 

 As the sand-martins always live in colonies, a favoured 

 cliff is very soon riddled by their nest-holes. They seem 

 to live happy, care-free lives, for, by the nature of their 

 nesting habits, they are well protected from all enemies, 

 except the marauding schoolboy. 



An occasional visitor to our shores, with nesting habits 

 similar to those of the sand-martin and gorgeous plumage 

 which compares favourably with that of any tropical bird, 

 is the bee-eater. About the size of a thrush and not so 

 heavily built, the bee-eater is a veritable living rainbow. 

 Green, blue, yellow, orange, brown, white and metallic 

 black are the colours which, harmoniously arranged and 

 displayed to advantage during the bird's elegant flight, 

 render it "almost top beautiful to belong to this world." 

 The colours of its exquisite plumage vary as the light 

 strikes them at different angles. So gorgeously arrayed is 

 the bee-eater that it is hardly necessary to add that it 

 is in great request as a trimming for ladies' hats. 



Like the sand-martin, this bird lives in colonies, and its 

 burrows are always excavated in the side of a cliff. 

 Fragile as is its beak, it is yet strong enough to tunnel 

 into soft soil. As an engineer it compares unfavourably 

 with the sand-martin. Its burrow rarely exceeds a foot 

 in length, so that the sitting bird is plainly visible from 

 the outside. Moss is the material of which the nest is 

 composed, if the structure deserves the name of nest, for 

 it is little more than a clump of moss on which the pearly 

 white eggs are laid. 



Our most richly apparelled native bird is undoubtedly 

 the kingfisher. Though quite common in all parts of the 

 country, he is not so frequently seen as might be expected. 

 Despite his gorgeous coat, he harmonises so well with his 

 surroundings that, when at rest, only the experienced eye 



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