The Canadian Horticuliurist. 



261 



THE LOGGERHEAD SHRIKE. 



rHIS bird, doubtless, derives its common name (Butcher bird) from the 

 fact that he slays many more creatures than he devours. He seems 

 to have an insatiate love of carnage. I have known him to kill birds 

 when enough food was stored in his larder to last him for weeks. He 

 has the curious habit of impaling on thorns, or sharp twigs, all the 

 carcasses not required fot immediate consumption. He generally 

 makes his residence in some locality in which there are thorn trees, 

 and woe unto- any small bird which may enter into his chosen territory. He is 

 remarkably swift on the wing, and when he makes a dash he seldom misses the 

 object of his pursuit. I have seen him with seeming amusement catching large 

 moths and grasshoppers, which he also impaled after cutting off their wings and 

 legs. Sometimes he impales mice and frogs ahve to perish miserably. The 

 majority of bodies thus impaled are eaten by bugs or left to wither in the sun 

 and be blown away. 



Fig. 64. — Laxius Lidoviciants (Linn). 



An instance of desperate rapaciousness is related by Mr. Macnamara, a 

 blacksmith in Kingston. He was startled by the screaming of a sparrow, chased 

 into his shop by a shrike, which certainly would have slain his intended victim 

 only for the timely interference of a sympathizing man. Sometimes a shrike will 

 attack a larger bird. Mr. H. Stratford, Naturalist, Kingston, while out hunting 

 for specimens, observed a robin being attacked by a shrike, which he shot in 

 order to save the robin's life. I have known him bolt through an open window 

 into an inhabited room and attack a caged canary. 



The shrike is not provided with the murderous talons of the hawk or the 

 owl, but with his powerful beak he generally crushes the skull of his victim. Of 

 the two species of shrikes which visit us here, the Loggerhead or Grey shrike is 

 the more common. He comes from the south early in spring, and nests in >Liy. 



