HOUSE AND GARDEN 
July, 1914 
way, and less frequently twittering richly on the perch. When 
caught with such a beakful he would look at me for a moment, 
and then calmly and rather ostentatiously bolt it, as if to say: 
“That food was for myself; I know of no mate or nest.” And 
he would perch unconcernedly in the tree or fly away for more 
grubs. I sometimes saw him feed the female. In receiving the 
ofifering she would flutter her wings 
and utter a begging twitter, precisely 
as young birds do when fed. 
In about two weeks the youngsters 
were hatched, which I knew from the 
fact that the bluebirds were both busy 
carrying in food. It was now safe to 
watch domestic affairs more narrowly. 
Birds will desert eggs, but they never 
desert nestlings. So I looked freely 
in on the newly born nestful in their 
twilight and coolness, while the pair 
made soft protests from neighboring 
trees. But seeing that I intended no 
harm, they soon went more indiffer¬ 
ently about their work. They came 
alternately to the box, now the male, 
now the female, near to every three 
minutes during the day. The orchard 
had been plowed, and on this fur¬ 
rowed land they reaped a full harvest 
of slugs, almost at their threshold, so 
that very little searching was neces¬ 
sary. 
At about this time a pair of king¬ 
birds were laying a foundation for a 
home on a branch above the bluebirds’ 
establishment. The latter resented 
this invasion of their roof-tree, and 
made no scrpule about attacking the 
trespassers. But the kingfishers had 
nested in this same apple tree the year before, and felt a kind of 
ownership. Moreover, they were not the birds to be driven off 
thus easily, and in the lulls of a sort of running skirmish with 
the bluebirds, they managed to lodge some straws and feathers 
among the apple blossoms of their chosen limb. A long white 
string even fluttered defiantly from the spot, like a flag on a 
castle. 
Things had reached this state when I one day planted my 
camera beneath the tree to make exposures of the bluebirds. I 
had scarcely arranged things, and repaired to a short distance, 
when the female arrived at the perch 
with a large worm. She stood motion¬ 
less for some minutes, looking at me 
with her big thrush eyes, and seemed 
scarcely to notice the click 
A quaint house for a bluebir 
tached 
of the shutter when I 
pressed the bulb of my long 
tubing. But when I looked 
away 
heard 
A bird bath made from an old tree trunk with a pan of 
galvanized tin 
I almost instantly 
a chorus of fine 
notes from the in¬ 
terior of the box, 
and the mother 
flitted out and off. 
After a minute or 
more the male ap¬ 
peared, watched 
me from the perch 
end, was photo¬ 
graphed, surrendered his prize, and departed. I had had barely 
time to shift plates between visits. They showed little or no fear 
of the camera. There were clamorous young to be fed, and the 
parents could not afford to be put off by trifles. 
The kingbirds, however, had observed the affair with more 
suspicion, as it subsequently proved. What with bluebirds and 
clicking boxes it was plainly no place 
for them. In a day or two they had 
moved their nesting material, precious 
string and all, to a pear tree down by 
the road, where at present they are 
living in a kind of warfare with some 
robin neighbors in a neighboring 
spruce. 
But the bluebirds were no sooner 
free from tyrannis than a new worry, 
not to say fright, arose. I had a tame 
bluejay, Jim, whom I had lately lib¬ 
erated, and who spent his time (when 
not flying about with us) in a cherry 
tree and grape arbor near the house. 
From the cherry tree he one afternoon 
made an ambitious flight which hap¬ 
pened to carry him to the old russet. 
The bluebirds were on the spot at once 
making most melancholy cries. For 
is not the jay notorious in birddom as 
a nest-pilferer? Indeed, a pair of 
song sparrows (inhabitants of a cedar 
near the grape arbor) had been much 
exercised over Jim for several days, 
one at least keeping mark upon his 
movements at all times. But Jim, 
personally, was a peaceable chap, and 
d made from birch bark and at- had never so much as heard of nests, 
to a shelf His intentions were wholly innocent. 
But when in his caterpillar quest he 
hopped inadvertently near the bluebird box, the members of that 
household grew frantic, one of them charged him, and fairly 
knocked him out of the tree. Jim flew off screaming with indig¬ 
nation at such an outrage. And for a while after he had even 
better cause for indignation. At the disturbance all the bird in¬ 
habitants of the neighborhood had assembled to see what was 
happening, and they successively “hustled” the poor fellow until 
he found peace again in the grape arbor. After Jim had been 
driven from the field the lordlv kingbird dispersed the idlers, and 
even waylaid a passing flicker to show his prowess. 
The bluebirds probably thought it advisable to get their family 
out of such doubtful surroundings, and on June 6, the next morn¬ 
ing at sunrise, they encouraged the youngsters to venture forth. 
At times all during the day I would see a small flotilla of wabbly 
young bluebirds flying to one point or another, convoyed by their 
anxious parents. There was considerable soft “churring” and 
considerable feeding. The old birds were evidently hard pressed 
keeping account of their several wayward mouths. This went 
on for a day or two, when the whole family drifted out of the 
neighborhood. 
It was not to be the end of bluebird affairs in my orchard, how¬ 
ever. They had lived in it and found it good — and found that 
the dangers which had seemed to threaten there were more fan¬ 
ciful than real. In something like a week the pair were back 
alone, and the male was again at his love-making and glad music. 
They went to the old house, looking in frequently/and I expected 
that they would use it for a second brood. But they fell to ex¬ 
amining another box recently put up and nearer the house, and 
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