292 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Aug. 20, 1910. 
eggs of blue—the softest of robin’s egg blue. 
My hand became entangled in a flimsy bit of 
material and on looking closely I found it to be 
part of one of my lace handkerchiefs, which 
the robin had evidently stolen from the wash 
as it lay in the sun bleaching on the grass, and 
for the loss of which I had secretly accused 
our colored “wash lady” for months. I crept 
back from my tour of inspection filled with ad¬ 
miration for the pretty songstress who had the 
rare esthetic taste to line her nest with lace, and 
more fully‘ agreeing with the writer who said: 
“Without the robin’s delicious music our spring 
mornings would be like a landscape without the 
rose or a summer evening without its tints.” 
A meadowlark became a favorite of mine, not 
only for the pleasure its sweet song gave me, 
but for the beautiful lesson I learned from her. 
I had been greatly interested in the nest she was 
building in a meadow adjoining our lot. and in 
the way in which she was assisted-by her mate. 
Man-like, he seemed to do all the drudgery such 
as carrying big weed stalks and bits of grass, 
while she performed the esthetic task of lining 
it with dainty bits of dry leaves. During the 
time they were absent in search of building ma¬ 
terial, I used to run over and take a peep into 
the nest. They -were building it in a natural de¬ 
pression in the ground in a well concealed place. 
After a while it was completed and they both 
set upon it, apparently well satisfied with their 
joint contract. One day a man drove into the 
meadow with a team and mower, and mowed the 
place clean. With the hay went the nest of my 
little feathered friend. Did she cry; did she 
weep? Did she tear her hair? Not at all. In¬ 
stead she flew to the fence and perching there 
sang her sweetest song. It taught me the value 
of accepting a bad situation gracefully. 
The red-headed woodpeckers and the yellow- 
bellied sapsuckers that sink their bills into the 
bark of the trees came in for a great part of 
Mr. Purdy’s scorn. Every time he saw them 
pecking at the bark he concluded they were do¬ 
ing great damage, until we discovered that they 
only bored into the trees that were infested by 
a wood-boring larvae, or where insects were lo¬ 
cated. I like to see them cling to the trees and 
brace themselves with their short and stiff tails. 
The sapsuckers are beautiful and to my mind 
a beautiful or attractive bird is as welcome to 
our forest trees as a useful one with a large 
appetite for insects. So the ones that are beau¬ 
tiful and useless remain as well as those that 
are homely and helpful. For several years Air. 
Purdy has refrained from cutting down a dead 
tree that stands dangerously near our barn, for 
we have found it to be the home of woodpeckers. 
The tree looks as though it had passed through 
a malignant form of smallpox. There must be 
a thousand holes in it. 
What shall I say of the beautiful bluejay with 
his nest-robbing habits and his desire to lord it 
over all the other birds? Shall I say that he is 
nature’s illustration that beauty is only skin 
■deep? He has neither pleasing manners nor 
song, the usual note being a coarse creaking- 
gate sort of a noise. 
One day the sun was shining very warm and 
I went over in a corner of the lot to gather some 
tall grass. As I walked along I saw a tiny blue¬ 
bird not old enough to walk. It was roasting 
in the hot sun and I placed it in the shade where 
it might safely rest until the old bird should 
come to it. I walked away a short distance and 
watched. After a while two bluebirds flew to 
the tree and seemed to be talking to each other 
as though in great trouble. At last they flew 
down on the grass and tried to coax the little 
bird to follow them. One of them took a worm 
in his mouth and fed the little one, and then 
hopped away a few steps, chirping and coaxing, 
but the little thing did not stir. The old bird 
flew away out of sight and seemed to have gone 
to tell all his neighbors, for in a few moments 
the tree was alive with birds. They all perched 
on one limb of the tree and held a great con¬ 
fab, and by the way they chattered, seemed very 
much distressed that they could not teach the 
little one to fly. Presently a man came with a 
ladder and put him back into the nest. Quiet 
was restored and all the birds that had congre¬ 
gated flew to their respective homes. 
Jessie B. Purdy, 
[to be concluded.] 
Big Rattlers. 
Raleigh. N. C, Aug. 10 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: The State museum now contains the 
largest rattlesnake, mounted, in any collection 
in the world. It may not be generally known, 
but it is true that in North Carolina the largest 
rattlers are found. The United States snake ex¬ 
perts are the authority for this statement. 
It must be borne in mind that the skin of a 
snake can be greatly stretched, so that after it 
has been removed, it can be pulled out in any 
way to make the snake appear longer or of 
greater girth. In this case the taxidermist, Tom 
Addicks, made a perfect plaster cast and on this 
mounted the skin, which was made to fit pre¬ 
cisely and to conform to every measurement. 
This snake is six feet eleven inches in length, 
eleven inches in girth and weighed seven pounds 
ten ounces. It has twelve rattles. The width 
of its body, lying flat, is four and a quarter 
inches. The length of tail from vent to rattles, 
but not including the latter, is only four and a 
quarter inches. The head is three and a quarter 
inches wide. The snake is of the diamond 
variety. It is mounted nearly at full length. It 
was killed at Havelock, near Lake Ellis, by J. J. 
Ballard, with one blow on the head, with a small 
stick, so that not even the skin was broken. He 
took this care so as to secure for the museum 
in perfect condition a snake which was the 
largest he had ever seen. 
Near the same place Mr. Addicks, Herbert 
Brimley and Mr. Brimley’s two little sons had 
an exciting and peculiar experience with another 
rattlesnake, and a rather large specimen, too. As 
they were walking, Mr. Brimley stepped over the 
snake while his son Arthur saw it and stopped. 
The snake was in coil, but was as gentle as the 
traditional lamb. A noose was put over his head. 
He did not rattle, but was lifted and carried 
along. Not until his bearer struck a bush with 
him did this serpent turn in the alarm. 
The bite of the rattler does not appear to 
'affect other snakes. In the State museum a 
rattler bit a kingsnake so deep that blood flowed 
quite freely, but there was no further damage. 
This rattler bit another rattler, but with no re¬ 
sult. Fred. A. Olds. 
The Forest and Stream may be obtained from 
any newsdealer on order. Ask your dealer to 
supply you regularly. 
About Band-Tailed Pigeons. 
Berkeley, Cal., Aug. 6. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: In a recent fishing trip to the Sur 
River, a coast range stream about forty miles 
south of Monterey in this State. I took along a 
.22 caliber rifle for predatory animals—’coons, 
foxes, jays, etc., it being too early for game 
shooting of any kind. 
I saw several birds that I take to be the band¬ 
tailed pigeon, a bird about as large as a blue 
rock and nearly the same color on the back. The 
head, throat and breast were a delicate brown, 
verging on pink. At the nape of the neck 
of the males was a narrow white collar and be¬ 
low that on the neck the feathers were of a 
beautiful metallic green. Across the tail was a 
dark band nearly an inch wide from which I 
assume it derives its name; its legs and bill are 
yellow, except that the tip of the latter was 
black. 
They came out of the oak and redwood forests 
to feed upon the grain fields from which the 
crops had just been gathered, and as food was 
abundant, were very fat and excellent eating. 
They bear no resemblance to the passenger pig¬ 
eon for which they seem sometimes to have been 
mistaken, and if I remember rightly are rather 
larger. 
There is a mystery about them, however, and 
that is my principal reason for writing to you 
in the hope that you will be able to throw light 
on it. That they breed in that locality is evi¬ 
dent, for one of the females I killed had eggs 
in her, but although I talked with a number of 
men who had lived all their lives in that sec¬ 
tion and were perfectly familiar with every 
square mile of its territory, knew all the birds 
and animals indigenous thereto and could tell 
me all about their habits and breeding methods, 
I did not find one who had ever seen a wild pig¬ 
eon’s nest, or who knew anything about their 
breeding places. 
They were usually flying about in small flocks 
of from ten to fifty, but whether they nested in 
colonies or in pairs, or where their nests were 
located not a soul could tell. Someone it seems 
to me must know where these birds nest, and if 
so I should like to hear from them. 
One other question before I close, did not 
the passenger pigeon have red legs? 
Forked Deer. 
[The band-tailed pigeon is believed to lay a 
single egg, which it deposits sometimes on a very 
flimsy nest of twigs built in an oak, pine or 
spruce tree. An informant of Major Bendire 
appears to believe that the bird in some way 
carried its egg around with it, but we do not 
know that this has ever been confirmed. 
In Arizona the band tail pigeons build either 
in colonies, or separately, but build rather thin¬ 
ly made nests through which the eggs can be 
seen from below. Very frequently the nests are 
built in crotches and forks of smaller branches. 
We are inclined to think this is about all that 
is known of the birds’ breeding. The best orni¬ 
thologists very much doubt that the birds carry 
their eggs. 
Of course it is impossible for us to suggest 
where the birds that you particularly refer to— 
those of the Sur River, south of Monterey—may 
breed. It w'ould probably require observation 
by local ornithologists to answer this question. 
The passenger pigeon’s feet were red. —Editor.] 
