160 The Bird 
surprising in its numbers and 
extent. Every class of living 
beings appears, at certain phases 
of its existence, to check or come 
into intimate contact with other 
unrelated groups, radically affect- 
ing the most isolated, in ways 
too subtle for our observation. 
A little green flycatcher snatch- 
ing a tiny gnat from its hiding- 
place beneath a leaf seems 
a trivial incident, and yet eas ed ina ee 
(the watcher) an active 
hunter. 
events no more important than this are felt around the 
world, so delicate is the balance of Nature. 
the effects of accumulated 
Oddities of Birds’ Diet 
To give any adequate idea of the vagaries of the diet 
of birds would require a volume by itself, but certain changes 
in feeding habits, due to 
some increased pressure in 
the struggle for existence, 
are too interesting to be 
passed by unnoticed. They 
show us how plastic and 
adaptive birds as a whole 
are,—how, often, instead 
Fic. 123.—Red Squirrel (the watched), Of giving up and becoming 
food of hawks and owls. y P, : 
(R. H. Beebe, photographer.) extinct, a certain race will 
