1902
March 9
(No. 3)
dignity and deliberation owing, no doubt, to the
fact that such buds as they were able to obtain
grew on short twigs within easy reach of the
firm and comparatively broad surfaces of the 
branches on which they could walk or stand as
securely as on the ground.
Partridges "budding."
  Just when the Partridges arrived at the tree
this morning I am unable to say. I saw them
first, as I have already stated, about six o'clock;
they began departing some twenty minutes later, one
or two at a time, at intervals of a minute or less, 
flying straight to the neighboring woods but in three
or four different directions, suggesting that they had
come from several different places. I feel very sure 
that all which visited the orchard this morning
assembled in the trees near the barn although to
reach it they had to pass over or near fifty or more
apple trees which stand between it and the woods. It would be
interesting to know whether they have exhausted 
the supply of palatable buds (they never take them all
or in sufficient numbers, even, to appreciably injure the
trees) elsewhere in the orchard or have only just 
discovered that the buds on this particular tree are
especially abundant or savory.
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