OUR WINTER BIRDS. 57 



their wants. In summer the same species are much 

 more shy, so winter gives us a better opportunity to 

 study the habits and dispositions of the various birds 

 which remain with us. 



With most species family ties are not broken in win- 

 ter. Bluebirds, perhaps more so than most of our birds, 

 maintain a strict family relation during the winter, even 

 while assembling in large flocks. Not only do the part- 

 ners remain true to each other during their lives, but 

 they continue their care over the young throughout the 

 first fall and winter. 



When a pair of bluebirds succeed in rearing three 

 broods in a season, in the autumn these broods unite 

 and stay with the parents, making a little flock of about 

 fourteen. All the autumn through they keep together, 

 feeding from the same bushes — poke, ampelopsis, and 

 other wild berries — and upon such stray insects as they 

 may find. 



The first cold days of December send them to the 

 cedar swamps, where great numbers congregate. Here, 

 too, large flocks of robins keep them company. But 

 each mild day brings the bluebirds from their retreat 

 back to their unforgotten home; and there is nothing 

 more fascinating in bird life than to see the frolics of 

 the young birds and the grave demeanor of the parents. 

 The young visit the various houses in which they were 

 reared, sometimes two or three entering at the same 

 time, and all the while keeping up their low, sweet 

 twittering, as if conversing. 



