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OFFICIAL ORGAN OF THE WISCONSIN AUDUBON SOCIETY: 
One Year 50 Cents 
Single Copy 5 Cents 
Published by the Wisconsin Audubon Society at Madison, Wisconsin 
Entered as second class matter August 23, 1909, at Madison, Wis., under the act of Congress of March 3, 1879 
VOL. XV 
DECEMBER, 1913 
No. 4 
A DIFFERENT 
By George 
Have you ever met some one on the 
street who looked strangely familiar, 
yet of whom you felt certain that you 
had never seen him before? I have, 
many times, hut never in so interest¬ 
ing a form as recently in that beau¬ 
tiful Munich park known as the Eng- 
lish garden. The stranger was a bird, 
a black bird, yet not quite a black¬ 
bird. Somehow it seemed to me that 
his swagger way, his short but merry 
chirp, his wellfed roundness, were fa¬ 
miliar, and yet he was no bird that 
over occurred in my own country. 
The next week I saw him again, with 
his wife (as she evidently was) way up 
the magnificent valley of the Isar, 
“ rolling rapidly” (Remember the 
poem?). I watched them until I saw 
one of them suddenly grab a worm. 
“Why, if you were not so like a chim¬ 
ney sweep, I’d say you are a robin,” 
T said to myself, and then R dawned 
upon me. He was like our good old 
robin, in everything but color. His 
flight, his round shape, his size, his 
manner of running over the ground 
and of deftly catching worms, all were 
the same; even (in a manner) the 
difference between man and wife. For 
he was glossy black, she wore a sooty 
BLACKBIRD 
Wagner 
grey, yet the difference was not great. 
Of course I looked him up in my book 
of German birds. The Germans call 
him Amsel or Schwarzdrossel, and he 
is about as close a relative of our 
robin as can be found. No wonder he 
looked familiar. The English call him 
blackbird, but he has nothing to do 
with our blackbirds whatever. 
The Amsel is found over most of Eu¬ 
rope, central Asia and north Africa. 
In all but the most northern regions 
and the Alps, he stays throughout the 
year. lake our robin he has left his 
native forest, and has come to live as 
the close friend and neighbor of man. 
Like our robin also, he lives mainly on 
worms and insects, but when berries 
are ripe, he demands his fair share. 
Why not? He’s earned them. lie has 
been accused of throwing young birds 
out of their nests, but has not been 
convicted of the crime as yet. 
The nest is much like that of the 
robin, rather coarse, and in it are laid 
and hatched four to six blue green 
eggs, spotted with rusty brown. And 
as with our robin, two (sometimes) 
even three broods are hatched during 
a season. 
