IDYLLS OF BIRD LIFE 
The chickadee, however, serves a more useful purpose than 
trymg to cheer faint-hearted humanity. It is the well known 
and destructive enemy to the canker worm moth, and it is estK 
mated the chickadee eats over a hundred thousand eggs in the 
/ j Uv 
twenty-five days it takes this moth to crawl up the trees. It 
I v -^ \ ' 
may readily be seen that it pays to protect the chickadee in 
Winter for the good deeds he performs in Summer. 
Another of our permanent feathered residents is the white- 
breasted nuthatch. A hunter of the deep, silent pine woods is 
' . > • ; ‘: a: w 
this fearless little acrobat. He is a trifle smaller than the Eng¬ 
lish sparrow. The top of his head and nape are black, while his 
back is slate-colored. The wings, of a dark slate, are tipped 
with black, which fades to brown. The tail feathers are brown- 
j 
ish black with white bars. The sides of the head are white. 
The body, underneath, is at first a white, but shades to a pale 
red under the tail. 
Probably you have seen him while walking through the 
woods on a cold Winter’s day, running along the branch of sohie 
t / / 
■ tree; now on the underside, again on top, busily engaged in 
breaking up little pieces of bark, searching for spider’s 7 eggs. 
IK J JpL 
At your approach he pauses in his work and peers fearlessly 
u 
