DISTEIBOTION OF BIRDS. 15 



for the open and was often observed feeding far afield in flocks of 

 from 100 to 300. Of the birds of the open, that fed far out in all the 

 five lots and did not depend on adjacent cover, there remain but two 

 to be mentioned, the vesper sparrow and the savanna sparrow, which 

 visited the farm only during migration, but helped, nevertheless, in 

 the valuable work of destroying weed seeds. 



BIRDS THAT DEPEND ON COVEE. 



Cover furnished by farm. — Other species, mainly sparrows, though 

 occurring on the arable area, fed less generally out in the centers 

 of the fields, and depended on protecting cover. This was afforded in 

 part by an osage orange hedge which bounds three sides of lot 2, and 

 by blackberry bushes and cedar and sassafras trees along fence rows. 

 Excellent cover was furnished, also, by a narrow belt of locusts, cedars, 

 and cultivated cherry trees along the edge of the river bluff, and by 

 a tangle of blackberry, honeysuckle, smilax, wild grape, bittersweet, 

 and trumpet creeper that grows under the trees and in many places 

 covers the face of the bluff (PI. VI, fig. 1). Other good cover, nesting 

 sites, and feeding grounds are afforded by the trees and bushes around 

 the house, by the forested gully of the hog lot (PI. IV, fig. 2), and by 

 the timbered outlets and bushy upper courses of Persimmon Branch 

 and Partridge Branch. (The course of Persimmon Branch near the 

 outlet can be seen in PI. XII, fig. 2.) To the thickets of the hedge- 

 rows and streams is due the presence on the arable land of many 

 species that would not live on unwatered and wholly cleared farms. 



Field Sparrow. — The field sparrow, which appears so often in the 

 open that it may almost be grouped with the preceding class, is found, 

 on observation, to be dependent on cover. But it is a bird of the 

 broom-sedge and briers, and its presence is not conditional on the 

 neighborhood of large trees, water, or buildings, as is that of some 

 other sparrows. Its nesting sites included each side of Persimmon 

 Branch, the broom-sedge and dewberry tangle of the high part of the 

 hog lot (PI. VI, fig. 2), and the crest of the bluff overlooking the swamp. 

 After the j^'oung were fledged small flocks of two or more families 

 followed the branches, hedgei-ows, brush piles, and fence rows all 

 about the arable part of the farm, even finding their way along a rail 

 fence to tobacco seed beds in the woods. The field sparrows avoided 

 timothy, but foraged far out in weedy old cornfields where the stalks 

 remained standing, and when new corn had tasseled they fed under its 

 shelter. They were found with most certaint}^ however, in waste 

 grounds bearing little but broom-sedge and briers. 



Chipping Sparrow. — The chipping sparrow, the field sparrow's con- 

 gener, in conformity to its semidomestic habits, nested in the door 

 yard, the kitchen garden, the adjacent orchard, and cedar trees near 

 the. storage barn. It was characteristic of roadside and rail fence and 



