_Their plumage dazzles not, but yet can sweeter strains be heard?
Let other feathers vaunt the dyes of deepest rainbow flush,
Give me old England’s nightingale, its robin and its thrush._ COOK.
Despite the fact that we live in a small and thickly populated
country, we are singularly rich in song birds, thanks to our numerous
old furze-clad commons, game preserves, and a healthy sentiment in
the great majority of rich and poor alike towards the wee, feathered
carol-singers that make grove and hillside ring with their sweet, happy
music.
This little book deals in a concise and popular manner with the
appearance, haunts, habits, nests, eggs, songs, and call notes of the
winged melodists that breed in various parts of the British Islands.
I have endeavoured to describe them in such a way that the reader may
be able to identify them for himself or herself in wood and field,
and where two species bear a similarity of appearance or song, to
emphasise the points wherein they differ.
The study of our native song birds will be found to contain many
delightful curiosities, and to present not a few entertaining problems.
For instance, all our first-class melodists, such as the Nightingale,
Song Thrush, Blackcap Warbler, Woodlark, and Garden Warbler, are
dressed in the most sober of sober colours. Male migrants generally
arrive upon our shores before the females, and at once commence to
sing and practise all kinds of curious antics in order to attract the
attention of their prospective brides when they arrive. Individual
birds of the same species vary greatly in the quality of their songs,
and nearly all the members of a species sometimes sing better in one
part of the country than another. Birds are first-class plagiarists,
and not only copy each other’s notes, but upon occasion actually
improve the quality of the music they borrow. Some of them, such as the
Chaffinch, practise their notes thousands of times per day, and a Song
Thrush sings as many as sixteen hours out of the twenty-four.
The following questions in regard to the behaviour of some of our
feathered melodists are amongst those put to me by both young and old
after my lectures, and contain a good deal of food for reflection:
Why do some birds sing by night as well as by day after they have
mated? Why do some birds cease to sing as soon as their young ones
are hatched, and others continue practically all the year round? Why
does a caged Skylark sing blithely in a dingy alley, where he has no
mate to attract, no rival to challenge, nor any apparent condition of
life to induce a feeling of happiness? Why does a Skylark practise its
notes on the ground more during the closing than the opening part of
the season? How do birds know of a coming change in the weather and
sing joyously to foretell it long before man, with all his acquired
experience, is aware of the fact? Why do some winged melodists, such as
the Blackbird for instance, sing the best during a shower of rain? Is
it in anticipation of an increased supply of food? Would a chick that
had never heard the song of its own species be able to sing it when it
grew up?
No answer to many of these interesting questions that are constantly
cropping up will be found in any ornithological work with which I am
acquainted, and they show two things clearly to my mind, viz.: How
little we really know about even our common song birds, and what a
great desire there is on the part of the public to find out.
Nature is never prodigal in the giving up of her secrets, but the
diligent student is sure to discover some interesting fact or solve
some entertaining problem; and I would urge all young people who care
for the delights of the country to take up the study of Nature’s
charming musicians. They will find it deeply interesting to learn to
identify birds by their songs and call notes, and even to imitate the
latter with sufficient skill to attract members of the species to which
they belong.
Finally, I trust I may be permitted to hope that this little book will
stimulate an interest in our song birds, which have always been a
never-ending source of solace and delight to me.