The House Wren 



By FRED. L. HOLTS, Mankato, Minn. 



With photographs by the Author 



IT has been my pleasure for several summers to put up Wren boxes, and to 

 watch their tenants. The tameness, audacity and nimble ways of the Wrens, 

 and their exuberant twittering song make them delightful birds to have 

 around a city home. 



Wrens usually arrive in this locality about the second week in May, and go to 

 selecting their homes very soon after arrival. I put up two boxes last year, and 

 before they had been here a week the Wrens had begun to build in one box, and 

 had preempted the other also by occasionally carrying material into it. This 

 second box was later used for the second brood. 



SHOWING THAT THE NESTING MATERIAL RARELY LEAX'ES 

 ROOM FOR THE BIRD 



I had no trouble in keeping the House Sparrows from the boxes. If the hole is 

 not more than an inch in diameter, the Sparrows cannot get in, but the Wrens can. 

 One winter I left the Wren box attached to a shed. A red squirrel took possession 

 of it. He gnawed the hole large enough for him to enter. Next spring I fastened 

 the box to a tree. I wished to test the statement I read in Birn-Lord that the Spar- 

 rows would not build in a box attached to a swaying tree. The Sparrows soon 

 discovered the box, went in and examined it, but, on thinking it over, decided not 

 to build there. Later the box was used by Wrens which, however, were not 



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