BIRDS AT WORK AND PLAY.
It sounds very strange to speak of a bird at play. But you can
see that birds do play, if you will give yourself the pleasure
of watching them. They run along under the hedges and fences at
hide-and-seek. They will stop suddenly and scold at one another for
not playing "fair"; and they actually play at leap-frog, hopping over
one another's backs, never once using their hands.
Sometimes they play "tag" high up in the air, especially the
humming-birds and others of swift wing. You can see them playing when
they are so high that they look like bumble-bees. Then perhaps they
fly out of sight in the blue of the sky.
But the birds seem to do more work than play. It is as if they were
saying,
"All play and no work
Makes a bird a mere shirk."
Most father birds help their mates in the cradle making, whenever
they can get away for a few minutes from the orchestra. But the
mother has the care of everything and does the most and the finest
work. We have sometimes thought the mother would do better if left
all to herself, the fathers are so fussy and awkward at housekeeping.
Once, in the middle of winter, we saw a father linnet trying his
best to coax his mate to build a nest on a little shelf on the upper
balcony. He carried straws in his bill, and sat on the shelf, and
coaxed his mate to his side, whispering to her, as if he were saying,
"How nice this is," and urging her to "Go right to work." We guessed
all that, you know, about their talking together, while we stood and
watched them out of the window.
But the wise little mother bird just laughed provokingly and flew
away. We thought she was laughing, for the father bird looked a
little bit ashamed, and held his head down, though he still clung to
his straw and remained for a while sitting on the little shelf. He
might have known that was no time or place to build a cradle. It was
midwinter, and besides the shelf was slippery.
It is common for a pair of birds to talk about housekeeping, or even
to build, a long while before they need the nest. We have seen them
hunting for the best spot and chatting about it, as if they were
saying, "This will never do," or, "This will be just the right place
when the time comes."
We have seen towhees and other birds picking up pieces of sticks and
string in November, and carrying them about as if they did not know
what to do with their treasures. We should think better of them if
they would lay the sticks and twine away in a safe place until they
are ready to use them. They seem never to think of that, but drop the
things wherever they happen to be.
Birds like to pull at twine even if they have no use for it. They
pick at the ends of fibrous bark, as if they valued most highly what
costs them the most trouble to get.
A lady we knew was in the habit of throwing out of the window the
hairs which came out of her head when she used the comb and brash
in the morning. These hairs were caught in a bush, and the birds
discovered them. One day her son found a bird's nest near the window,
all lined with the white hairs which once grew on his dear mother's
head. You may be sure the son keeps that bird's nest among his
treasures.
Birds are very fond of hairs of any sort for their nest linings. We
have many times placed them within their reach and sight, and they
will take them up. They also use chicken feathers, if they are close
at hand, and bits of soft paper.
If you want to see something that will amuse you, fasten on a tree
or log a piece of old rope that has a ravelled end. Every day in
nesting time the birds will tug at that ravelled end of rope, turning
somersaults in their hurry, and spending more time chasing one
another away from it than in actual work.
When a bird begins to build her nest, she uses coarse materials
first, just as a house builder uses beams and timbers to begin with.
The bird and the house builder save all the fine stuff for the last.
Look closely at a nest when you find one. Pick up an old last year's
nest that has blown down. This year's nests do not belong to you.
See how there are, first, large sticks or weeds, or rolls of mud.
Between the large sticks or weeds there are small, short ones. You
can imagine that these pieces all together are nails and boards, and
help to hold the whole nest together. Perhaps these may be all bound
together with spiders' web or string, or even paper.
We have seen nests made of nothing but one kind of weed; usually a
weed that has a strong smell, like wild sage or yarrow, is chosen.
We think that the smell of these strong-scented weeds prevents lice
or mites from invading the nest. Perhaps the force of habit or taste
has led the bird to select this material. Probably her mother before
her made the same sort of a nest, and so she thinks that is about the
right thing to do.
Some birds, as the swallows, make mud houses, after the manner of the
Mexicans. We often wonder if these people got their idea of house
building from the birds.
[Illustration: Barn Swallow]
Other birds use sticks and cement, as a man does brick and mortar.
Some of the sea birds lay their eggs on a bare, flat rock. Even these
do not roll off from the rock, for all eggs are oblong and cannot
roll in a straight line. We have never seen a perfectly round egg. If
you take an egg of any kind, as a hen's egg, and try to roll it down
the floor or lawn, you will see what we mean. Then try a perfectly
round ball. You will see that it is better that birds' eggs are
oblong or elliptical.
[Illustration: Marsh Owl.]
The cactus wren[16] makes her nest in the middle of a great barbed
cactus in our mountain washes or desert places. The tiny Costa's
humming-bird[17] builds its frail nest in the prickly elbow of the
low cactus that grows in California all over the barren lowlands.
This is probably for safety. A snake could hardly reach a nest which
was built in the middle of a cactus whose needles, or thorns, are
sometimes an inch long.
[16] _Heleodytes brunneicapillus._
[17] _Calypte costæ._
[Illustration: Costa's Humming-Bird]
[Illustration]