BIRD LIFE IN WINTER 



spy out the screech owl hiding in the thick of a hem- 

 lock-tree. What an event it is in the day's experience ! 

 It sets the whole clan agog. 



While I was walking in the December woods, one 

 day, my attention was attracted by a great hue and 

 cry among these birds. I found them in and about 

 a hemlock-tree, — eight or ten chickadees and four 

 or five red-bellied nuthatches. Such a chiding chorus 

 of tiny voices I had not heard for a long time. The 

 tone was not that of alarm so much as it was that 

 of trouble and displeasure. 



I gazed long and long up into the dark, dense 

 green mass of the tree to make out the cause of aU 

 this excitement. The chickadees were clinging to the 

 ends of the sprays, as usual, apparently very busy 

 looking for food, and all the time uttering their shrill 

 plaint. The nuthatches perched about upon the 

 branches or ran up and down the tree trunks, inces- 

 santly piping their displeasure. At last I made out 

 the cause of the disturbance, — a Kttle owl on a limb, 

 looking down in wide-eyed intentness upon me. 

 How annoyed he must have felt at all this hullabaloo, 

 this lover of privacy and quiet, to have his name 

 cried from the treetops, and his retreat advertised 

 to every passer-by ! 



I have never known woodpeckers to show any 

 excitement at the presence of hawk or owl, probably 

 because they are rarely preyed upon by these ma- 

 rauders. In their nests and in their winter quarters, 

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