Residents of the Atlantic, Middle, Southern and Middle Western States
are, doubtless, well acquainted with the slate-colored Junco. This
little feathered specimen is more familiarly known as "Snowbird."
The Oregon Junco ("Junco hyemalis var. Oregonus") is a sub-species, and
is found throughout the Pacific coast region from California to Sitka.
It is, by no means, confined exclusively to Oregon. Its darkest-hued
plumage makes the bird very conspicuous when the ground is covered with
a soft and spotless mantle of snow.
The sooty-black head, flesh-colored bill and white breast, sharply
contrast in color. On the sides are pinkish colored feathers; the back
is rufous-brown and the two outer tail feathers pure white, showing
when the bird flies. In western Oregon it is a winter visitant,
arriving with the first cool days of autumn.
As winter approaches these snowbirds become more plentiful, hopping
about in the small bushes in quest of food. A great deal of pleasure
and interest may be found in studying these birds, especially when the
ground is covered with snow. By casting bread crumbs on the snow, the
little fellows flock around, and are easily tamed. In winter their
only note is a sort of chirp, sometimes uttered several times in quick
succession when alarmed. With the warm days of spring they begin their
song, sometimes many singing at once, and soon the majority disappear
to a higher altitude to breed.
The Oregon Junco builds its nest in hollows in the ground under low
bushes. The nest is constructed flush with the surface and in holes
among the roots of bushes and trees, and under woodpiles. Usually,
the nest is made of dry grasses rather loosely placed together, with
a lining of cowhair, and contains four and sometimes five handsome
greenish-white eggs, spotted and wreathed with purple.--J. Mayne
Baltimore.
* * * * *
Olive Thorne Miller, in her fascinating little book, "The First Book
of Birds," speaking of how the birds work for us, says: "Chickadees
like to eat the eggs of cankerworms; and for a single meal one of
these tiny birds will eat two hundred and fifty eggs, and he will take
several meals a day. Now, cankerworms destroy our apples. When they get
into an orchard in force, it looks, as Miss Merriam says, as if it had
been burned over. Robins, cat-birds, and shrikes, and several others,
like to eat cutworms, which destroy grass and other plants. As many as
three hundred of them have been found in the stomach of a robin, of
course for one meal. Ants are very troublesome in many ways, and three
thousand of them have been taken from the stomach of one flicker."
Why kill these birds that are so useful to us and so beautify nature?
Many others are just as useful and some that occasionally do damage
amply repay us in other ways.
[Illustration: THE CALICO BASS.
(Pomoxys sparoides.)
COPYRIGHT 1900, BY
A. W. MUMFORD, CHICAGO.]