410 



British Cage Birds. 



England, but is met with in most Continental countries. It 

 chiefly frequents woods, parks, groves, and thickets, and is 

 difiScult to pursue, as it can elude the vision almost without 

 an effort, it is so agile and alert in all its movements. It 

 prefers to dwell in warm, isolated, wooded localities, where 

 insects abound, and shelter from observation is easily obtained. 

 It builds its nest in holes of trees, with moss, dried grass, and 

 leaves. The hen lays from four to six ash-coloured eggs, 

 streaked and marked with dusky spots of the same colour, 

 and incubates about fourteen days. These birds cling with 

 considerable tenacity to the place of their choice, and are 

 only driven from it, by severe weather, in mid-winter, to 

 places where food is more readily procurable ; in the spring, 

 they return to their former haunts. 



Methods of Capture. — The Creeper may be ensnared by 

 placing limed twigs in and around the holes of trees con- 

 taining their nests, or by fixing horsehair nooses to some of 

 the branches. They are most difficult to capture, and are 

 seldom taken, excepting in the late autumn or winter, when 

 places are specially baited with a few live mealworms, placed 

 in the interstices of the branches of trees which they are 

 known to frequent regularly. 



Food and Treatment. — The food of Creepers, when roam- 

 ing from tree to tree and wood to coppice, is insects and 

 their larvae. In captivity, they may be fed on ants' eggs, 

 mealworms, a little scraped raw lean meat (beef or mutton), 

 mixed with breadcrumbs, small flies, and the insects and 

 their larvae that are to be found in the pieces of moss 

 taken from the boles of trees. In the course of time they will 

 partake of the Compounds No. 1 and No. 2 {vide pp. 189 and 

 190), but it will be judicious to add a few insects or ants' 

 eggs, as an inducement, in the first instance. In winter, 

 when insects are difficult to obtain, a little finely-scraped raw 

 beef or mutton must be given twice or three times a week, 

 or the birds will probably die for want of it. 



Rearing the Young. — The young may be reared by treating 

 in all respects the same as Blue Tits. The nestlings return 

 to the nest to sleep until they are fully fledged, and able 

 to cater for themselves. It is better not to take them from 

 the nest until they are a month old, as they are very delicate 

 and difficult to rear when taken younger. 



