1889
Dec. 13
Ashby, Massachusetts.
  Warmer than yesterday with high S. W. wind and alternating clouds
and sunshine. A March-like day the roads muddy, a smell of
spring in the air.
  Off on foot with Faxon for the entire day, starting at 9.30
and going over nearly the same ground covered during the
last day of our visit in June. Very few birds; - a flock of
five Chickadees and two Red-bellied Nuthatches (canadensis)
and two Creepers in white pine woods on the edge of the
swamp where we heard the D. caerulescens in June, two
Ruffed Grouse started among laurel in this swamp and a
third which rose from a bare hill-side where the wood
had been lately cut, a Sparrow not positively identified
but thought to be S. monticola which Faxon flushedm from a
weed stubble and which disappeared in a swamp thicket,
these with a few Redpolls found in the weed stubble just
mentioned and a flock of twenty-five or thirty seen near
Mr. Brook's house before we started were literally all
the birds noted save two crows which Faxon saw from his
window early in the morning.
  Mr. Peaslee, a young school teacher boarding with the
Brook's tells me that he found both the Spotted Woodpeckers
near Ashby in the winter of 1888-9 and that he also saw
Nuthatches (carolinensis) and Blue Jays in the village. A
woodchopper whom we interviewed yesterday near Watatic also
asserted that he occasionally saw Log-cocks (Hylotomus) on the
mountain in winter and large flocks of "Snow-birds" (P. nivalis)
in the fields. The latter, he said, appeared only after heavy
snow storms. Both [delete]those[/delete] of the persons just mentioned as well as Mr. Brooks
were positive that no Crows winter about Ashby. It is