18 



THE AUDUBON BULLETIN 



Criticising the Cowbird 



(Copied from Mr. T. E. Musselman's notebook.) 



April 20. A pair of house wrens have taken possession of the south 

 compartment of my hanging barrel. 



April 22. The pair of robins which have a nest in the upper 

 branches of the pear tree, object to the wrens in the hanging box 

 below. Often when one of the wrens is struggling to get a long stick 

 thru the entrance hole, the robins fly down and frustrate the effort, the 

 wren lodging itself in a nearby lilac bush where he scolds and no doubt 

 swears and says some very caustic things about his neighbors up above. 



May 1. Believe the wrens have finished building. 



May 2. It rained last night. Many new migrants here. I dug in 

 the garden and my pair of robins enjoyed a feast of earth worms. I 

 took several worms and hung them on the step before the wrens' nest. 

 The wrens did not like the intrusion, and the male bird seized the 

 morsels and flew to a neighboring elm tree where he dropped them. 



May 4. Robins have a full set of eggs. Believe the female wren 

 also has started laying. 



May 6. I heard the wrens complaining and chattering. Fearing a 

 cat, I hurried onto the back porch with my rifle, but could see no reason 

 for the commotion. Suddenly the mother robin left her nest up in the 

 pear tree and flew headlong toward a clump of long grass at the base of 

 the syringa bush. A female cowbird had been hiding there and flew 

 away with the robin in hot pursuit. Again the wrens demonstrated 

 their ability to say mean things — evidently this time about the cowbird. 



May 8. Heard the wrens talking spiritedly. I took up my station 

 on the porch but could not see anything. Quiet was finally restored, 

 and the wrens began their busy duties. Both disappeared in a neigh- 

 boring yard and I also noticed that the robins were not on guard. 



From the base of the syringa crawled forth a sneak — a female cow- 

 bird. She took half a dozen steps 

 and then stopped. She peered up- 

 ward, then suddenly crouched by a 

 leaf, and without motion she waited. 

 One wren busily flew to the box, 

 then was gone. Closer and closer 

 crawled the "sneak." Again she 

 squatted and again she was unseen. 

 When the wrens were gone she rose 

 and stretched herself in all direc- 

 tions to see that the way was clear. 

 Again she squatted and waited. Im- 

 mediately upon the disappearance 

 O'f the wren she flew to the box and 

 in went the dirty blackish head but 

 the hole in the box is iust the size 



YOUNG COWBIRD IN REDSTART'S P , , , 



nest of a quarter so she could not get in. 



