ILLINOIS AUDUBON SOCIETY 



39 



remained for 

 feeding about 



a large mirror, and one of us took up the task of trying to keep 

 a patch of sunlight reflected on the nest, while the other stayed 

 by the camera. After a time the parent birds ceased to have 

 much fear of the queer looking object set up so near to their 

 home, and we finally succeeded in getting this picture of a very 

 alert, rather suspicious parent bird just ready to enter with a 

 fat green worm. 



After the nestlings had left the nest the twine ball was emp- 

 tied, and we were much surprised at the coarseness of the lin- 

 ing. The material had evidently been gathered from a nearby 

 plum thicket and consisted mostly of stout knotty twigs. Even 

 the lining was scarcely any finer and it seemed a very rude home 

 for such tiny baby birds. 



July sixteenth an albino robin 

 appeared in a bur oak grove 

 nearly a week 

 We saw it fre- 

 quently, but saw no color ex- 

 cepting the pink of the eyes, 

 beak and feet. It had a queer 

 habit of standing on one leg, 

 altho the leg appeared to be 

 normal. It seemed to be con- 

 tinually tagging the other rob- 

 bins about rather than being a 

 member of any flock. We had 

 difficulty at first in identifying 

 it as a robin, altho we were 

 sure it was a thrush from its 

 shape. We identified it of a surety by its voice and later we saw 

 it frequently with other robins. 



A neighbor found a gold-finch's nest in a tall common 

 thistle. The nest was exquisitely made of fibres and lined with 

 thistle down. There were five eggs and later five baby birds. The 

 thistle plant stood alone in an open pasture field, but the nest, 

 built into the heart of the bushy plant was quite well hidden. 



Edgar Eisenstadt 

 Bertha Cramer 



Moline 



The fall migration brings to mind the interesting visit we 

 riad during the entire past winter with a red-headed wood- 

 pecker, unusual, too, in that these birds are seldom seen in our 

 parts during the cold winter months. Early last fall this 

 brightly colored fellow was busy about two wren houses I had 

 placed over the rose trellis just outside the sun room windows 

 and which had been without tenants, the echo of his tapping 

 reverberating through the house. Thinking he was hammering 

 at the house entrance to enlarge it that he might enter I went 

 out one Sunday afternoon to investigate and found that not the 



