em Ue BaOr Ne 3B UL te Hob tie N i 
Bird Visitors 
By ELIZABETH BAROODY 
AS USUAL the birds have helped during the past year to make life most 
interesting at 3130 Wenonah Avenue, Berwyn, Illinois. During that time 
we have seen within our gates 75 different species that we could definitely 
identify and several others, particularly fall warblers, that we could not. 
Winter, of course, is the dull season, but cardinals came daily to our 
dining room window box for sunflower seeds, and the downy and hairy 
woodpeckers visited our suet baskets. So did the less welcome English 
sparrows and starlings. 
It was in March that the northward procession began with the grackles, 
the robins, and the juncos. More birds came in April, some to stay for 
but a day, some to linger for weeks. Among the latter, thrice welcome 
were the white-throated sparrows with their clear, sweet song; the wood 
thrush, which all during its stay was a delightful alarm clock; and the 
towhees that visited us spring and fall. The male towhee drew our atten- 
tion first on the rainy day of April 8 by his loud singing. The female did 
not appear until the sixth of May. Also among the April comers was the 
mourning dove which nested precariously high up in the neighbor’s elm 
tree. In May two baby doves sought shelter beneath our shrubbery. Only 
one pair of birds, robins, nested in our yard, and two of their nestlings 
came to grief in spite of our best efforts. 
May Day was memorable for purple finches amid the snow. We put 
cracked corn and millet seed under the evergreens for the white-throats, 
but no sooner did we turn away than a little flock of purple finches as well 
as white-throats came for the grain. Five days later white-crowned 
sparrows came to tarry for several days before going on northward. All 
during May the warblers kept coming. One scarcely dared to leave the 
window and knew not which window to choose for a vantage point. The 
first of the warblers was the black and white on May 5. The last was the 
mourning on May 30. Another very interesting visitor was a female eastern 
whip-poor-will which on May 13 fluttered up like a big brown moth from 
our bed of myrtle and alighted on a branch of a bush near a bedroom 
window. : 
Spring was the busiest season but the summer was not lacking in 
interest. Apples (Jonathans preferred) and grapes on the lawn and 
abundant water enticed many birds to come in. On August 20 I recorded 
in my journal “a delightful hard working day in the yard.” I marvel 
that I got anything done for I also wrote, “And the birds! The robins, 
many young ones, brown thrashers, and the catbirds ate grapes. The 
cardinal family ate sunflower seeds and chipped lustily. A female or an 
immature redstart fluttered about. A black and white warbler inspected 
the magnolia tree. A yellow-throated vireo searched among the leaves of 
the mountain ash, while a female rose-breasted grosbeak and a pair of 
orioles ate the ash berries. Robins and catbirds ate the blue berries of the 
Viburnum lentago. A downy came in. A flicker dug for ants. Blue jays 
ate everything in sight.” 
