yellow-bellied woodpeckers--the most rare and secluded, and, next to the
red-headed, the most beautiful species found in our woods,--breeding in
an old, truncated beech in the Beaverkill Mountains, an offshoot of the
Catskills. We had been traveling, three of us, all day in search of a
trout lake, which lay far in among the mountains, had twice lost our
course in the trackless forest, and, weary and hungry, had sat down to
rest upon a decayed log. The chattering of the young, and the passing to
and fro of the parent birds, soon arrested my attention. The entrance to
the nest was on the east side of the tree, about twenty-five feet from
the ground. At intervals of scarcely a minute, the old birds, one after
another, would alight upon the edge of the hole with a grub or worm in
their beaks; then each in turn would make a bow or two, cast an eye
quickly around, and by a single movement place itself in the neck of the
passage. Here it would pause a moment, as if to determine in which
expectant mouth to place the morsel, and then disappear within. In about
half a minute, during which time the chattering of the young gradually
subsided, the bird would again emerge, but this time bearing in its beak
the ordure of one of the helpless family. Flying away very slowly with
head lowered and extended, as if anxious to hold the offensive object as
far from its plumage as possible, the bird dropped the unsavory morsel
in the course of a few yards, and alighting on a tree, wiped its bill on
the bark and moss. This seems to be the order all day,--carrying in and
carrying out. I watched the birds for an hour, while my companions were
taking their turn in exploring the lay of the land around us, and noted
no variation in the programme. It would be curious to know if the young
are fed and waited upon in regular order, and how, amid the darkness
and the crowded state of the apartment, the matter is so neatly managed.
But ornithologists are all silent upon the subject.
This practice of the birds is not so uncommon as it might at first
seem. It is indeed almost an invariable rule among all land-birds.
With woodpeckers and kindred species, and with birds that burrow in
the ground, as bank swallows, kingfishers, etc., it is a necessity.
The accumulation of the excrement in the nest would prove most fatal
to the young.
But even among birds that neither bore nor mine, but which build a
shallow nest on the branch of a tree or upon the ground, as the robin,
the finches, the buntings, etc., the ordure of the young is removed to a
distance by the parent bird. When the robin is seen going away from its
brood with a slow heavy flight, entirely different from its manner a
moment before on approaching the nest with a cherry or worm, it is
certain to be engaged in this office. One may observe the social-sparrow,
when feeding its young, pause a moment after the worm has been given and
hop around on the brink of the nest observing the movements within.
The instinct of cleanliness no doubt prompts the action in all cases,
though the disposition to secrecy or concealment may not be unmixed
with it.
The swallows form an exception to the rule, the excrement being voided
by the young over the brink of the nest. They form an exception, also,
to the rule of secrecy, aiming not so much to conceal the nest as to
render it inaccessible.
Other exceptions are the pigeons, hawks, and water-fowls.
But to return. Having a good chance to note the color and markings of
the woodpeckers as they passed in and out at the opening of the nest, I
saw that Audubon had made a mistake in figuring or describing the female
of this species with the red spot upon the head. I have seen a number of
pairs of them, and in no instance have I seen the mother-bird marked
with red.
The male was in full plumage, and I reluctantly shot him for a
specimen. Passing by the place again next day I paused a moment to
note how matters stood. I confess it was not without some compunctions
that I heard the cries of the young birds, and saw the widowed mother,
her cares now doubled, hastening to and fro in the solitary woods. She
would occasionally pause expectantly on the trunk of a tree, and utter
a loud call.
It usually happens when the male of any species is killed during the
breeding season, that the female soon procures another mate. There
are, most likely, always a few unmated birds of both sexes, within a
given range, and through these the broken links may be restored.
Audubon or Wilson, I forget which, tells of a pair of fish-hawks, or
ospreys, that built their nest in an ancient oak. The male was so
zealous in the defense of the young that it actually attacked with
beak and claw a person who attempted to climb into his nest, putting
his face and eyes in great jeopardy. Arming himself with a heavy
club, the climber felled the gallant bird to the ground and killed
him. In the course of a few days the female had procured another mate.
But naturally enough the step-father showed none of the spirit and
pluck in defense of the brood that had been displayed by the original
parent. When danger was nigh he was seen afar off, sailing around in
placid unconcern.
It is generally known that when either the wild turkey or domestic
turkey begins to lay, and afterwards to sit and rear the brood, she
secludes herself from the male, who then, very sensibly, herds with
others of his sex, and betakes himself to haunts of his own till male
and female, old and young, meet again on common ground, late in the
fall. But rob the sitting bird of her eggs, or destroy her tender
young, and she immediately sets out in quest of a male, who is no
laggard when he hears her call. The same is true of ducks and other
aquatic fowls. The propagating instinct is strong, and surmounts all
ordinary difficulties. No doubt the widowhood I had caused in the case
of the woodpeckers was of short duration, and chance brought, or the
widow drummed up, some forlorn male, who was not dismayed by the
prospect of having a large family of half-grown birds on his hands at
the outset.
I have seen a fine cock robin paying assiduous addresses to a female
bird, as late as the middle of July; and I have no doubt that his
intentions were honorable. I watched the pair for half an hour. The
hen, I took it, was in the market for the second time that season; but
the cock, from his bright, unfaded plumage, looked like a new arrival.
The hen resented every advance of the male. In vain he strutted around
her and displayed his fine feathers; every now and then she would make
at him in a most spiteful manner. He followed her to the ground,
poured into her ear a fine, half-suppressed warble, offered her a
worm, flew back to the tree again with a great spread of plumage,
hopped around her on the branches, chirruped, chattered, flew
gallantly at an intruder, and was back in an instant at her side. No
use,--she cut him short at every turn.
The _dénouement_ I cannot relate, as the artful bird, followed by her
ardent suitor, soon flew away beyond my sight. It may not be rash to
conclude, however, that she held out no longer than was prudent.
On the whole, there seems to be a system of Women's Rights prevailing
among the birds, which, contemplated from the stand-point of the male,
is quite admirable. In almost all cases of joint interest, the female
bird is the most active. She determines the site of the nest, and is
usually the most absorbed in its construction. Generally, she is more
vigilant in caring for the young, and manifests the most concern when
danger threatens. Hour after hour I have seen the mother of a brood of
blue grossbeaks pass from the nearest meadow to the tree that held her
nest, with a cricket or grasshopper in her bill, while her better-dressed
half was singing serenely on a distant tree or pursuing his pleasure amid
the brunches.
Yet among the majority of our song-birds the male is most conspicuous
both by his color and manners and by his song, and is to that extent a
shield to the female. It is thought that the female is humbler clad
for her better concealment during incubation. But this is not
satisfactory, as in some cases she is relieved from time to time by
the male. In the case of the domestic dove, for instance, promptly at
midday the cock is found upon the nest. I should say that the dull or
neutral tints of the female were a provision of nature for her greater
safety at all times, as her life is far more precious to the species
than that of the male. The indispensable office of the male reduces
itself to little more than a moment of time, while that of his mate
extends over days and weeks, if not months.[2]
In migrating northward, the males precede the females by eight or ten
days; returning in the fall, the females and young precede the males
by about the same time.
After the woodpeckers have abandoned their nests, or rather chambers,
which they do after the first season, their cousins, the nut-hatches,
chickadees, and brown creepers, fall heir to them. These birds,
especially the creepers and nut-hatches, have many of the habits of
the _picidæ_, but lack their powers of bill, and so are unable to
excavate a nest for themselves. Their habitation, therefore, is always
secondhand. But each species carries in some soft material of various
kinds, or, in other words, furnishes the tenement to its liking. The
chickadee arranges in the bottom of the cavity a little mat of a light
felt-like substance, which looks as if it came from the hatter's, but
which is probably the work of numerous worms or caterpillars. On this
soft lining the female deposits six white eggs.
I recently discovered one of these nests in a most interesting
situation. The tree containing it, a variety of the wild cherry, stood
upon the brink of the bald summit of a high mountain. Gray, time-worn
rocks lay piled loosely about, or overtoppled the just visible by-ways
of the red fox. The trees had a half-scared look, and that indescribable
wildness which lurks about the tops of all remote mountains possessed
the place. Standing there I looked down upon the back of the red-tailed
hawk as he flew out over the earth beneath me. Following him, my eye
also took in farms and settlements and villages and other mountain
ranges that grew blue in the distance.
The parent birds attracted my attention by appearing with food in
their beaks, and by seeming much put out. Yet so wary were they of
revealing the locality of their brood, or even of the precise tree
that held them, that I lurked around over an hour without gaining a
point on them. Finally a bright and curious boy who accompanied me
secreted himself under a low, projecting rock close to the tree in
which we supposed the nest to be, while I moved off around the
mountain-side. It was not long before the youth had their secret. The
tree, which was low and wide branching, and overrun with lichens,
appeared at a cursory glance to contain not one dry or decayed limb.
Yet there was one a few feet long, in which, when my eyes were piloted
thither, I detected a small round orifice.
As my weight began to shake the branches, the consternation of both
old and young was great. The stump of a limb that held the nest was
about three inches thick, and at the bottom of the tunnel was
excavated quite to the bark. With my thumb I broke in the thin wall,
and the young, which were full-fledged, looked out upon the world for
the first time. Presently one of them, which a significant chirp, as
much as to say, "It is time we were out of this," began to climb up
toward the proper entrance. Placing himself in the hole, he looked
around without manifesting any surprise at the grand scene that lay
spread out before him. He was taking his bearings and determining how
far he could trust the power of his untried wings to take him out of
harm's way. After a moment's pause, with a loud chirrup, he launched
out and made tolerable headway. The others rapidly followed. Each one,
as it started upward, from a sudden impulse, contemptuously saluted
the abandoned nest with its excrement.
Though generally regular in their habits and instincts, yet the birds
sometimes seem as whimsical and capricious as superior beings. One is
not safe, for instance, in making any absolute assertion as to their
place or mode of building. Ground-builders often get up into a bush,
and tree-builders sometimes get upon the ground or into a tussock of
grass. The song-sparrow, which is a ground builder, has been known to
build in the knot-hole of a fence rail, and a chimney swallow once got
tired of soot and smoke, and fastened its nest on a rafter in a hay
barn. A friend tells me of a pair of barn swallows which, taking a
fanciful turn, saddled their nest in the loop of a rope that was
pendent from a peg in the peak, and liked it so well that they
repeated the experiment next year. I have known the social-sparrow, or
"hair-bird," to build under a shed, in a tuft of hay that hung down,
through the loose flooring, from the mow above. It usually contents
itself with half a dozen stalks of dry grass and a few long hairs from
a cow's tail loosely arranged on the branch of an apple-tree. The
rough-winged swallow builds in the wall and in old stone heaps, and I
have seen the robin build in similar localities. Others have found its
nest in old, abandoned wells. The house-wren will build in anything
that has an accessible cavity, from an old boot to a bomb-shell. A
pair of them once persisted in building their nest in the top of a
certain pump-tree, getting in through the opening above the handle.
The pump being in daily use, the nest was destroyed more than a score
of times. This jealous little wretch has the wise forethought, when
the box in which he builds contains two compartments, to fill up one
of them, so as to avoid the risk of troublesome neighbors.
The less skillful builders sometimes depart from their usual habit,
and take up with the abandoned nest of some other species. The blue
jay now and then lays in an old crow's-nest or cuckoo's-nest. The
crow-blackbird, seized with a fit of indolence, drops its eggs in the
cavity of a decayed branch. I heard of a cuckoo that dispossessed a
robin of its nest; of another that set a blue jay adrift. Large, loose
structures, like the nests of the osprey and certain of the herons,
have been found with half a dozen nests of the blackbird set in the
outer edges, like so many parasites, or, as Audubon says, like the
retainers about the rude court of a feudal baron.
The same birds breeding in a southern climate construct far less
elaborate nests than when breeding in a northern climate. Certain
species of water-fowl that abandon their eggs to the sand and the sun
in the warmer zones, build a nest and sit in the usual way in
Labrador. In Georgia, the Baltimore oriole places its nest upon the
north side of the tree; in the Middle and Eastern States, it fixes it
upon the south or east side, and makes it much thicker and warmer. I
have seen one from the South that had some kind of coarse reed or
sedge woven into it, giving it an open work appearance, like a basket.
Very few species use the same material uniformly. I have seen the nest
of the robin quite destitute of mud. In one instance, it was composed
mainly of long black horse-hairs, arranged in a circular manner, with
a lining of fine yellow grass; the whole presenting quite a novel
appearance. In another case, the nest was chiefly constructed of a
species of rock moss.
The nest for the second brood during the same season is often a mere
make-shift. The haste of the female to deposit her eggs as the season
advances seems very great, and the structure is apt to be prematurely
finished. I was recently reminded of this fact by happening, about the
last of July, to meet with several nests of the wood or bush sparrow
in a remote blackberry field. The nests with eggs were far less
elaborate and compact than the earlier nests, from which the young had
flown.
Day after day, as I go to a certain piece of woods, I observe a male
indigo-bird sitting on precisely the same part of a high branch, and
singing in his most vivacious style. As I approach he ceases to sing,
and, flirting his tail right and left with marked emphasis, chirps
sharply. In a low bush near by, I come upon the object of his
solicitude--a thick, compact nest composed largely of dry leaves and
fine grass, in which a plain brown bird is sitting upon four pale blue
eggs.
The wonder is, that a bird will leave the apparent security of the
tree-tops, to place its nest in the way of the many dangers that walk
and crawl upon the ground. There, far up out of reach, sings the bird;
here, not three feet from the ground, are its eggs or helpless young.
The truth is, birds are the greatest enemies of birds, and it is with
reference to this fact that many of the smaller species build.
Perhaps the greatest proportion of birds breed along highways. I have
known the ruffed grouse to come out of a dense wood and make its nest
at the root of a tree within ten paces of the road, where, no doubt,
hawks and crows, as well as skunks and foxes, would be less liable to
find it out. Traversing remote mountain-roads through dense woods, I
have repeatedly seen the veery, or Wilson's thrush, sitting upon her
nest, so near me that I could almost take her from it by stretching
out my hand. Birds of prey show none of this confidence in man, and,
when locating their nests, avoid rather than seek his haunts.
In a certain locality in the interior of New York, I know, every
season, where I am sure to find a nest or two of the slate-colored
snow-bird. It is under the brink of a low, mossy bank, so near the
highway that it could be reached from a passing vehicle with a whip.
Every horse or wagon or foot passenger disturbs the sitting bird. She
awaits the near approach of the sound of feet or wheels, and then
darts quickly across the road, barely clearing the ground, and
disappears amid the bushes on the opposite side.
In the trees that line one of the main streets and fashionable drives
leading out of Washington city, and less than half a mile from the
boundary, I have counted the nests of five different species at one
time, and that without any very close scrutiny of the foliage, while
in many acres of woodland, half a mile off, I searched in vain for a
single nest. Among the five, the nest that interested me most was that
of the blue grossbeak. Here this bird, which, according to Audubon's
observations in Louisiana, is shy and recluse, affecting remote
marshes and the borders of large ponds of stagnant water, had placed
its nest in the lowest twig of the lowest branch of a large sycamore,
immediately over a great thoroughfare, and so near the ground that a
person standing in a cart or sitting on a horse could have reached it
with his hand. The nest was composed mainly of fragments of newspaper
and stalks of grass, and though so low, was remarkably well concealed
by one of the peculiar clusters of twigs and leaves which characterize
this tree. The nest contained young when I discovered it, and though
the parent birds were much annoyed by my loitering about beneath the
tree, they paid little attention to the stream of vehicles that was
constantly passing. It was a wonder to me when the birds could have
built it, for they are much shyer when building than at other times.
No doubt they worked mostly in the morning, having the early hours all
to themselves.
Another pair of blue grossbeaks built in a graveyard within the city
limits. The nest was placed in a low bush, and the male continued to
sing at intervals till the young were ready to fly. The song of this
bird is a rapid, intricate warble, like that of the indigo-bird,
though stronger and louder. Indeed, these two birds so much resemble
each other in color, form, manner, voice, and general habits that,
were it not for the difference in size,--the grossbeak being nearly as
large again as the indigo-bird,--it would be a hard matter to tell
them apart. The females of both species are clad in the same
reddish-brown suits. So are the young the first season.
Of course in the deep, primitive woods also are nests; but how rarely
we find them! The simple art of the bird consists in choosing common,
neutral-tinted material, as moss, dry leaves, twigs, and various odds
and ends, and placing the structure on a convenient branch, where it
blends in color with its surroundings; but how consummate is this art,
and how skillfully is the nest concealed! We occasionally light upon
it, but who, unaided by the movements of the bird, could find it out?
During the present season I went to the woods nearly every day for a
fortnight, without making any discoveries of this kind; till one day,
paying them a farewell visit, I chanced to come upon several nests. A
black and white creeping warbler suddenly became much alarmed as I
approached a crumbling old stump in a dense part of the forest. He
alighted upon it, chirped sharply, ran up and down its sides, and
finally left it with much reluctance. The nest, which contained three
young birds nearly fledged, was placed upon the ground, at the foot of
the stump, and in such a position that the color of the young
harmonized perfectly with the bits of bark, sticks, etc., lying about.
My eye rested upon them for the second time before I made them out.
They hugged the nest very closely, but as I put down my hand they all
scampered off with loud cries for help, which caused the parent birds
to place themselves almost within my reach. The nest was merely a
little dry grass arranged in a thick bed of dry leaves.
This was amid a thick undergrowth. Moving on into a passage of large
stately hemlocks, with only here and there a small beech or maple rising
up into the perennial twilight, I paused to make out a note which was
entirely new to me. It is still in my ear. Though unmistakably a bird
note, it yet suggested the bleating of a tiny lambkin. Presently the
birds appeared,--a pair of the solitary vireo. They came flitting from
point to point, alighting only for a moment at a time, the male silent,
but the female uttering this strange, tender note. It was a rendering
into some new sylvan dialect of the human sentiment of maidenly love.
It was really pathetic in its sweetness and childlike confidence and
joy. I soon discovered that the pair were building a nest upon a low
branch a few yards from me. The male flew cautiously to the spot, and
adjusted something, and the twain moved on, the female calling to her
mate at intervals, _love-e, love-e_, with a cadence and tenderness in
the tone that rang in the ear long afterward. The nest was suspended to
the fork of a small branch, as is usual with the vireos, plentifully
lined with lichens, and bound and rebound with masses of coarse
spider-webs. There was no attempt at concealment except in the neutral
tints, which made it look like a natural growth of the dim, gray woods.
Continuing my random walk, I next paused in a low part of the woods,
where the larger trees began to give place to a thick second-growth
that covered an old Barkpeeling. I was standing by a large maple, when
a small bird darted quickly away from it, as if it might have come out
of a hole near its base. As the bird paused a few yards from me, and
began to chirp uneasily, my curiosity was at once excited. When I saw
it was the female mourning ground warbler, and remembered that the
nest of this bird had not yet been seen by any naturalist,--that not
even Dr. Brewer had ever seen the eggs,--I felt that here was
something worth looking for. So I carefully began the search,
exploring inch by inch the ground, the base and roots of the tree, and
the various shrubby growths about it, till, finding nothing, and
fearing I might really put my foot in it, I bethought me to withdraw
to a distance and after some delay return again, and, thus forewarned,
note the exact point from which the bird flew. This I did, and,
returning, had little difficulty in discovering the nest. It was
placed but a few feet from the maple-tree, in a bunch of ferns, and
about six inches from the ground. It was quite a massive nest,
composed entirely of the stalks and leaves of dry grass, with an inner
lining of fine, dark-brown roots. The eggs, three in number, were of
light flesh color, uniformly specked with fine brown specks. The
cavity of the nest was so deep that the back of the sitting bird sank
below the edge.
In the top of a tall tree, a short distance farther on, I saw the nest
of the red-tailed hawk,--a large mass of twigs and dry sticks. The
young had flown, but still lingered in the vicinity, and, as I
approached, the mother-bird flew about over me, squealing in a very
angry, savage manner. Tufts of the hair and other indigestible
material of the common meadow mouse lay around on the ground beneath
the nest.
As I was about leaving the woods my hat almost brushed the nest of the
red-eyed vireo, which hung basket-like on the end of a low, drooping
branch of the beech. I should never have seen it had the bird kept her
place. It contained three eggs of the bird's own, and one of the
cow-bunting. The strange egg was only just perceptibly larger than the
others, yet three days after, when I looked into the nest again and
found all but one egg hatched, the young interloper was at least four
times as large as either of the others, and with such a superabundance
of bowels as to almost smother his bedfellows beneath them. That the
intruder should fare the same as the rightful occupants, and thrive
with them, was more than ordinary potluck; but that it alone should
thrive, devouring, as it were, all the rest, is one of those freaks of
Nature in which she would seem to discourage the homely virtues of
prudence and honesty. Weeds and parasites have the odds greatly
against them, yet they wage a very successful war nevertheless.