70 IN BERKSHIRE FIELDS 



have been left on the shocks, or perhaps on the 

 ground not yet covered with snow, you will find that 

 they drill into the kernel and extract the meat, again 

 with the utmost neatness. In common with other 

 birds, they must like plenty of water to drink, 

 though I have never seen one, in spring or summer, 

 in our bird baths. I have, however, seen their 

 tracks about an open spring in the woods, where 

 the pheasants also came in great numbers, and I 

 have seen them eat ice as a thirsty dog will eat 

 snow. 



Although the chickadee is such a friendly little 

 beggar all winter long (indeed, the season through), 

 when he is merely engaged in the occupation of get- 

 ting food and the joyous pastime of living, when 

 breeding-time arrives he suddenly becomes highly 

 secretive, and gets as far out of sight as possible. 

 No doubt that is one of the reasons the species has 

 been so successful in the fight for survival. Like 

 the woodpecker and the bluebird, the chickadee 

 nests in a hole. Of course they have been known 

 to select holes close to a dwelling. Walter King 

 Stone tells me he knew of a pair who nested in a 

 cranny over a back stoop not more than two feet 

 above the heads of the passers. We now have an 

 artificial bird-box in the apple-tree by our kitchen 

 window, and as I write (in early May) a pair of 

 chickadees have been hopping in and out of it for 

 several days. But so far as we can observe they 

 have been engaged rather in taking the sawdust 

 out than taking any new material in. The same 

 pair have removed material from a blue-bird box 

 near by, on another tree, much to our disgust, for a 



