Carribean Sea, Mexico and Central and South America even 

 to Patagonia. 



How do these tiny creatures make such long journeys? 

 Most birds from Eastern North America follow the coast line 

 southward, stopping frequently to rest and feed as they go, 

 until they reach Florida and the Gulf States where they are 

 joined by immense flocks of other birds that have come down 

 the Mississippi Valley about the same time. Multitudes of 

 them remain there until spring. Many others, after a few 

 hours' flight, find homes in Cuba and nearby islands, while still 

 others, intent on reaching Mexico or South America, strike 

 directly across the Gulf in a southwesterly direction and con- 

 tinue on the wing until they have covered seven hundred miles 

 of distance. 



How do they avoid their enemies and how do they find 

 their way in their migrations? Swift-flying birds like the 

 Swallows have little fear of the birds of prey. They travel 

 boldly by daylight and rest at night ; but many migrants dread- 

 ing their enemies rise high in the air, and guided by the streams 

 and the mountains, move only at night. At such times numbers 

 of them may be seen flitting across the face of the moon. So 

 continuous is this stream of moving birds that the young ones, 

 which cannot know the way, make their first migration by sim- 

 ply falling into line with the older birds that have learned the 

 course on former journeys. 



But sight, marvelously keen as it may be, is not the only 

 sense which guides the birds in their movements. They pos- 

 sess a highly developed sense of direction which takes the place 

 of sight when all landmarks are wanting. This is sufficient to 

 enable certain birds to make the journey over the Atlantic 

 Ocean from Nova Scotia direct to South America, twenty-five 



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