HOW TO ATTRACT BIRDS. 



sizes useful for various birds, plans for making, and illustrations 

 of numerous bird boxes are given in Farmers' Bulletin 609. 1 Styles 

 of bird houses may be almost endlessly varied. These structures may 

 be improvised by anyone, but they may be purchased also from 

 numerous dealers. The most common errors in putting out bird 

 houses are choosing poor locations and supplying too many boxes. 

 A bird house needs only partial shade, and houses on poles usually 

 are taken. Martins prefer a house standing apart from trees. En- 

 trances to boxes should be sheltered by projecting roofs and should 

 face away from the prevailing wind and rain storms. 



All bird houses should be constructed so that the interior may 

 easily be examined and cleaned. This is not only important to 

 permit last year's rubbish to be thrown out, but is necessary in much 

 of the area for which the present bulletin is written to facilitate 

 inspection for gypsy-moth egg masses and cocoons. 



As a rule, birds do not like being crowded, and if a place is studded 

 with bird houses only a few af them will be occupied. Birds not 

 only do not want bird neighbors too near, but they are impatient 

 of human meddling, and therefore should be granted as much pri- 

 vacy as possible during the actual incubating and brooding. Nests 

 built in shrubbery are especially likely to come to a bad end if the 

 birds are frequently disturbed. 



If ground-nesting birds, as bobolinks, meadowlarks, and bob- 

 whites, are to be protected, grass in the nesting fields must not be 

 cut during the breeding 

 season. 



WATER SUPPLY. 



Nothing has a more potent 

 attraction for birds during 

 hot weather than drinking 

 and bathing places. The 

 birds' water supply should be 

 a pool not more than a few ,|j 

 inches deep, the bottom slop- 

 ing gradually upward toward 

 the edge. Both bottom and 

 edge should be rough, so as to 

 afford a safe footing. A giant 

 pottery saucer (fig. 4, a) is 

 an excellent device, or the 

 pool may be made of concrete or even metal, if the surface be 

 roughened (fig. 4, 5). The bird bath ma}^ be elevated, or on the 



FIG. 3. Tree guards. 



1 Dearborn, Ned, " Bird Houses and How to Build Them," revised, 1917. 



