128 Bird -Lore 



But this is not life, only a preparation for life. It is perhaps not joyous 

 to many, only the sign of coming joyousness. Still there is far more life in late 

 February and March than one uninitiated in the truths of Nature might 

 suspect; while April brings myriads of creatures we ought to know by sight 

 or sound, or some kindred sense. The early bluebird, the skunk-cabbage and 

 honey-bee are a few of the forms of life that greet the observant eye. If a 

 wave of sunlight breaks the chill of the air, an occasional "mourning cloak" 

 butterfly may appear. In grassland, woodland, and plowed fields, hordes 

 of insects are about to hatch from winter eggs, crawl forth from hibernating 

 refuges or to emerge from snugly hidden pupae, which have survived the 

 coldest weather, housed in the earth, under roots or in sheltered nooks. 



To check this winged army of destruction, other winged hosts are advan- 

 cing from the distant Southland, our migratory birds, whose coming brings the 

 joyous certainty of spring. How wonderful it is that just as leaves and buds 

 are swelling and unfolding, and insects in countless numbers are finding their 

 way to the open, the birds should arrive in a feathered multitude to swell the 

 ranks of living things. There is a reason for this, a law of nature, if we could 

 understand it, that governs the migratory movements of birds. 



There is a special work for birds to do in nature, and, with almost clock- 

 like regularity, they journey north exactly at the time when this work is 

 ready to be done. (Cmp. Bird-Lore Vol. XIII, No. 3, p. 160.) Perhaps you 

 have never thought of birds as workers. Watch them, and see how much they 

 do in a day, or even in an hour. Their chief work is to get food for themselves 

 and their nestlings, and, in doing this, they eat not only seeds and small ani- 

 mals, but also thousands and thousands of insects, which would otherwise 

 spread over the earth, devouring vegetation with frightful rapidity. 



If man had never tried to change the ways of Nature by cutting off for- 

 ests, draining and plowing up large tracts of land to plant to special crops, 

 if he had never brought into our country seeds and trees and insects and ani- 

 mals from across the ocean, it might be easier to study the natural habits of 

 birds, and to judge exactly what the results of these habits are. We have 

 already learned that birds are fitted with tools which enable them to crack 

 seeds of nearly all kinds, to dig beneath the bark of trees, to probe in the 

 earth, to scoop through the air and water, in short, to hunt for food in an 

 almost endless variety of ways and places. Since they are, on the whole, quick 

 to discover new kinds of food as well as new kinds of nesting-sites, we call 

 them easily adaptable to the changing conditions of wild and cultivated Nature. 



An illustration of the adaptability of birds to a new food-supply which is 

 now found in the north-eastern United States is shown in connection with 

 the gipsy and brown-tail moths, introduced insects whose yearly devastations 

 cost us many thousands of dollars. 



The Downy Woodpecker, Kingbird, Ring-necked Pheasant (introduced 

 into our country from the Old World), Phoebe, Least Fly-catcher, Scarlet 



