Your Feathered Neighbors 
THE MULTITUDE AND VARIETY OF BIRDS THAT VISIT YOUR YARD—HOW TO HELP SOLVE 
THEIR HOUSING PROBLEM—ON PROVIDING PUBLIC BATHS AND FREE LUNCH COUNTERS 
delight 
T HE endless 
watching the 
movements of birds, of gather¬ 
ing something of an insight into 
of 
graceful 
their life story, the 
pleasure that their 
melody and lively 
thrill of 
charming 
calls bring — 
these are suggestions of the ses- 
advantages 
of feathered 
thetic 
neighbors. 
To he relieved in part of the 
perpetual battle with weeds and 
the insect and rodent scourges, 
which, according to the United 
States Department of Agricul¬ 
ture, cause an annual loss to for¬ 
estry and agriculture in this 
country of over a billion dollars — this indicates the economic 
benefit to be derived from such associates. 
A few years ago such a paper as the present one would have 
been almost a waste of time. Few there were who would have 
considered bird life seriously, save from the standpoint of sport 
in the killing and satisfaction in the eating of these feathered 
neighbors. So 
The while-breasted nuthatch makes friends readily 
rapid 
been 
of 
general 
Bluebirds are not at all fussy about the architecture 
of their home 
however, has 
the progress 
knowl- 
a n d public 
sentiment that to¬ 
day there are few 
who do not value 
and appreciate birds 
as neighbors. The 
one question, then, 
is how shall we cul¬ 
tivate their intimacy 
and increase their 
abundance in our 
environments ? 
Two methods of 
attracting birds have 
gained considerable 
popularity and been used with 
varying success: providing arti¬ 
ficial nesting sites and supplying 
artificial food. 
If we have an abundance of 
suitable trees and shrubbery 
about our homes we shall be sure 
to have at least some of the com¬ 
mon birds which seek such nest¬ 
ing sites—the robin, chipping 
and song sparrows, catbird, 
brown thrasher and blue jay. 
As a rule, tree and bush nesting 
birds seek thick cover; therefore 
the more densely foliaged our 
trees and the more numerous 
and tangled the shrubbery, the 
more abundant will be such neighbors. 
A protected ledge on the porch or under a cornice may prove an 
acceptable home site for phoebe or robin; a good-sized chimney 
flue is almost sure to shelter the log cabin of a chimney swift; 
barn and eave swallows in well-settled parts of the couitry have 
long since forsaken the ancestral nest sites under overhanging 
rocks on cliffs, the 
former to plaster 
their mud nests on 
the rafters in wel¬ 
coming barns, the 
latter to line the 
eaves with their bot¬ 
tle - shaped domi¬ 
ciles. 
Woodpeckers ex¬ 
cavate burrows in 
the decayed trunks 
of trees in which to 
lay their eggs and 
rear their young. 
Rarely do they avail 
themselves of exca¬ 
vations which they 
find ready m a d e. 
Though not very confiding, the purple finch will not 
disdain a free home 
Some of your feathered neighbors, like the blue jay, nest 
almost anywhere 
After the blue jay had moved out, the slate-colored 
Junco took up quarters in the box 
And even a song sparrow later made itself at home in 
the same nest cavity 
371 
