A BIRD CALENDAR 



birds have ordinarily completed their sets, unless the season be 

 very backward, and many individuals in the last week of May. 

 The great bulk of the small birds are now incubating, and by the 

 10th many eggs are hatching. The month from May 25th to 

 June 25th offers more photographic opportunities bird-wise than 

 all the rest of the year combined. 



Some species which breed late are the following: Kingbird, 

 Crested Flycatcher, Orchard Oriole, about the 10th; Vireos and 

 Wrens are often somewhat late; Wood Pewee, 15th to 20th; Cedar- 

 bird and Chimney Swift from 20th to early July; the Goldfinch 

 last of all, usually the last week in July or first in August. 



SUMMER 



Most of the species have finished or are finishing breeding by 

 the time of the summer solstice. A few, just mentioned, habitually 

 breed in summer. Some, whose eggs have been destroyed lay a 

 second litter, and others habitually rear two broods, in consequence 

 of which facts occupied nests in sparing numbers may be found 

 till late in the summer. The following species are among those 

 which often raise two broods: Bob-white, Phoebe, Robin, Catbird, 

 Bluebird, House Wren, Yellow-throat, most sparrows and swal- 

 lows. Red-winged Blackbird, Meadowlark, and various others 

 occasionally. 



By July most of the birds become silent and secretive, having 

 begun the molt. Some species, before migrating South, wander 

 from their breeding localities, and species unfamiliar to a locality, 

 like certain Southern herons, are noted as far north as New Eng- 

 land or Nova Scotia. From mid-July and on, the flocking of 

 certain species occurs preparatory to the migration, such as 

 Swallows, Sparrows, Blackbirds, Bobolinks, Nighthawks. A few 

 migrant warblers appear in August. 



The return migration of the shore-birds begins about the 

 middle of July, and is at its height in August. The latter month 

 is a good time to visit the sea-coast to study shore-birds. Terns, 

 etc., and for yachting trips offshore among the ocean birds, such 



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