1909 
March 18 
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Lai 
flock of 
Redpolls 
Found a large flock of Redpolls in Birch Field. 
They flew up from the ground and alighted in low trees where 
I counted 80. There were still others in pines which I 
heard but could not see. They were so restless that I was 
unable to inspect many of them closely but I noticed at least 
8 or 10 rosy-breasted males, three of them sitting close 
together on the same branch. They must have stripped the 
birches of their seeds during the winter for I could detect 
no "cones" on any of these trees to-day although they were 
thickly hung with them last winter. The Redpolls were 
apparently now reduced to gleaning the fallen and scattered 
seeds for they returned to the ground beneath the birches 
as soon as they recovered from their alarm at my intrusion. 
Most of them chose open and mossy or grassy places but a 
dozen or more descended into a dense thicket of blackberry 
bushes intermingled with bushy young white pines where the 
ground was covered deep with fallen leaves, chiefly those 
of the gray birches that rose above the lesser growths. 
On approaching the birds closely (within 20 feet) 
I was surprised to find that they were scattering the leaves 
about by picking them up in their bills and flinging them 
rather violently to right and left and also by " scratching " 
much after the manner of Fox Sparrows, that is by first 
giving a bouncing hop forward and then kicking the leaf back- 
just 
ward with both feet/as they alighted on it. Of this there 
I 
