6 



, I 



occasionally and in low and marshy grounds on the shores of the 

 lake, and I have also seen it frequently in the neighbourhood of 

 Ottawa. 



It feeds on the seeds of vai-ious grasses and weeds, and such 

 insects as it can obtain at this season. Its call note is very soft and 

 melodious, and I have heard the male bird in the early days of 

 March utter a short but very sweet song. It is then just on the 

 point of setting oflf on its migration northward and its plumage has 

 begun to assume something of its summer brightness, the black 

 tufts of feathers on the head and the crescent shaped patch of black 

 on the tlu'oat of the male bird are then very conspicuous. 



Sometimes as eai'ly as the last week of February, though generally 

 in the first warm days in March the cawing of the crows is heard 

 for the first time, and their harsh voices sound pleasantly to our ears 

 because they are a.ssociated with the commencement of spring. 



It is true that occasionally in very mild winters one or two indi- 

 viduals do sometimes remain in particular localities, but these are 

 exceptions to the general rule and they may fairly be classed among 

 our migratory birds. 



I have said that their voices sound pleasantly because they are 

 associated with the coming spring, but for my own part, I confess, it 

 is only at that particular season that I can listen to them with any 

 degree of complacency. They are then doing good service in feeding 

 upon noxious insects and vermin of many kinds, but as the spring 

 advances and the various small bii'ds begin to lay their eggs and 

 hatch their young, the crow becomes the ruthless destroyer of both 

 eggs and young, and scores of the eggs or young of our Song Spar- 

 rows, Warblers, Thrushes and various other birds fall a prey to itt 

 voracious appetite. 



First among the arrivals in March of our smaller migratory birds 

 is the Song Sparrow (Melospiza Fasciata), and its short but sweet 

 song is the first to proclaim " that the winter is over and gone, and 

 the time of the singing of birds is come." The time of its arrival, 

 as I have noted it in various years, varies from the 16 th to the 23rd 

 of March, sometimes, in very backward springs, not until the firs 

 week in April. 



Almost at the same time with the Song Sparrow comes the Robin 

 (Turdus Migrator iu8 ), its cheery notes, whether heard from the top 

 of some tall maple, or as it scuttles through the bushes of the shrub- 



bery 



and 



