ANIMAL BEHAVIOR, WITH EXAMPLES 233 



Whenever she was sitting on her eggs and some one entered or 

 came out, she would fly away for a short time and show great 

 nervousness. These manoeuvres were kept up so frequently 

 that I wondered if she could possibly succeed in hatching her 

 eggs. During the night hours, from fi.30 to about 5 a.m. 

 she was able to sit continuously on her nest. After night was 

 fully estabhshed, she could not be induced to leave it, though 

 she was ever so timid in the daytime. 



The three young phcebes required an immense amount of 

 food, both parents being kept busy foraging for insects. The 

 latter consisted of almost every kind the parents could catch. 

 One day I found a small gray robber-fly, which was dropped by 

 one of the parents, below the nest on the„porch. The insect's 

 head was missing, so I kept watch to see if the birds always 

 practised decapitation before feeding them to the young. A 

 short time afterward I found a nearly full-grown but mutilated 

 mole cricket, which was inadvertently dropped by one of the 

 phoebes. It proved on inspection also to be without a head. 

 This was all the evidence I gathered on this point, but I think, 

 perhaps, it may be a common practice with phoebe to decapitate 

 her captive insects. 



It was interesting to note the instinctive dread exhibited 

 by the young towards a person's hand. When the ground was 

 jarred, or at the sound of a slamming door, they would open 

 their mouths quite freely, as when the parent birds came to 

 the nest, but when one of us put our hands near the young they 

 shrank back into the nest with abject fear and silence, at the 

 same instant almost closing their eyes. 



One of the young which I took out of the nest was at 

 first quite reluctant about feeding. After twenty-four hours, 

 however, it took insects from the tips of forceps or from my 

 fingers. The nest is kept clean by the mother bird, the excre- 

 ment being taken in her bill at the moment it is expelled and 

 carried some distance away and dropped. The droppings of 

 the little birds reflexly pass out the instant it swallows its 

 food, so the parent can attend to it immediately. 



The young bird which I took from the nest was afterwards 

 restored to it, and on August seventh all three of the young left 

 their nest simultaneously when I was making an inspection. 



