Taming Wild Birds without a Cage. 



129 



Three or four Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers came to the window-sill, and would some- 

 times peck the fingers of persons feeding them. The Brown Creeper was far more cau- 

 tious, and never came to the hand. 



The familiarity of the Canada Jay or Meat Bird is known to everybody who has 

 hunted or camped in the northern woods ; its fear is allayed by hunger even more promptly 

 than in Chickadees and Nuthatches. Audubon says of these birds that " when their 

 appetite is satisfied, they become shy, and are in the habit of hiding themselves among 

 close woods or thickets; but when hungry they show no alarm at the approach of man." 

 While his friend was fishing in a canoe on one of the Maine lakes in the summer of 1833, 

 "the Jays were so fearless as to 

 alight in one end of his bark, 

 while he sat in the other, and 

 help themselves to his bait. . . . 

 The lumberers or woodcutters 

 of this state, . . . frequently 

 amuse themselves in their camp 

 during the eating hour with what 

 they call ' transporting the car- 

 rion bird.' This is done by cut- 

 ting a pole eight or ten feet in 

 length, and balancing it on the 

 sill of their hut, the end outside 

 of the entrance being baited with 

 a piece of flesh of any kind. Im- 

 mediately on seeing the tempting 

 morsel, the Jays alight on it, and 

 while they are busily engaged 

 in devouring it, the woodcutter 

 gives a smart blow to the end of 

 the pole within the hut, which 

 seldom fails to drive the birds 

 high in the air, and not infre- 

 quently kills them. They even 

 enter the camps and would fain eat from the hands of the men while at their meals." 



Possibly no bird has keener vision or sharper ears than the Canada Goose, which in 

 its wild state is said to be vigilant, suspicious, and hard to be surprised, yet it is often easily 

 and quickly tamed. There are in Cleveland nearly forty of these geese, which are descended 

 from a smaller number introduced about twenty-five years ago. Their migratory impulse 

 has been completely lost, and their sense of fear subdued, but their other wild instincts 

 remain. They live mostly in the parks, going from one to another as the spirit moves 

 them, and breed on the small artificial islands in artificial ponds. I sometimes hear 

 their Jionk ! as they fly over the city at night or in early morning, and see their " harrow " 

 or " triangle " which plows the air by day often within bow-shot from Euclid Avenue. 



When the birds are feeding on a lawn you can walk among them and drive them 

 like a flock of tame geese, but they hate dogs and take to wing or water the moment one 

 9 



Fig. 126. Male Red-eyed Vireo prepared to inspect and clean nest. 

 Notice that in this series — Figs. 50-57, 125 — the birds uniformly occupy 

 the same perch. Detail of bird shown in Fig. 49. 



