big as a crow, he would be a terror to man and beast, for he is afraid
of nothing. This spirited mite of a bird will even attack an eagle, who
is big enough to eat him at a mouthful. He beats him too, for he comes
down on top of his head, where the big, clumsy fellow cannot get at him.
There he pecks and pulls out feathers till the eagle is glad to get out
of his clutches.
A hummingbird's nest is one of the prettiest things in the world. It is
not much bigger than a walnut, and is made of soft plant down, usually
of a yellowish gray color.
Perhaps you don't see how plant down can be made to keep in shape,
without twigs or grasses to hold it. If you could see the bird make it,
you would understand at once. She brings her stuff in small mouthfuls,
and works it into a solid mass by strong efforts with beak and feet. She
pokes and prods each tiny bunch as she brings it, till she makes it all
hold together. It is a sort of felt.
Then the little worker covers the outside with bits of lichen picked off
the trees, and held on, it is said, by cobwebs. This makes the nest
look exactly like the branch it is on. So it is very hard to see.
It takes a hummingbird several days of hard work to make a nest, because
she can bring only a little at a time. She does it alone too; her mate
has not been seen to help her at all.
I think the male ruby-throat does not help in the nest-building because
the little mother will not let him. She knows just how the cradle is to
be made, and she doesn't want him to bother her. She likes to have her
nest to herself just as she likes to have her honeysuckle to herself. I
don't say positively that is the reason, you know; I only guess it is.
After the nest is made, and two eggs about as big as small beans are
laid, the hummingbird begins to sit. When the nestlings come out of the
egg, they are about the size of honey bees, with bills no larger than
the head of a common pin. Twenty-one days they stay in the nest and are
fed by their hard-working little mother.
When the twins get their feathers, and their bills are growing longer
and longer, they sit up across the top of the nest, side by side. Then
they are very pretty, and not at all afraid of people. They will let one
gently stroke their backs. They will even answer in a soft murmur one
who talks to them.
Hummingbirds are never so afraid of people as other birds. They are
easily tamed. But they should never be caged, for they will not live
long in a house. They need food that we cannot give them.
A man had a hummingbird whom he kept alive a long time by letting him go
free when he seemed to need change of food. He would fly off, but always
came back. After the bird got to be very tame, the man brought two young
hummingbirds and put them in the cage with him. He did not notice them
much till they began to droop. Then the man opened the door to let them
out.
At once the elder bird took the little ones in charge, and coaxed them
to fly out with him. He led them to a place where he had found the tiny
spiders these birds like, and showed them how to get what they wanted.
They all ate their fill and then came back to the house, where they were
well contented to be.
The way the mother hummingbird feeds her babies is curious. When she
comes with food, she alights on the edge of the nest, and pulls a little
one up so that she can get at it. Then she runs her long, slim bill down
its throat, and pokes the food in with little jerks. It looks as if it
would kill the youngster, but he seems to like it. Anyway, he grows
very fast, and--as I said--in three weeks he is beautifully feathered,
with a bill as long as his mother's, and ready to fly.
A lady who had two young hummingbirds told me that they slept so soundly
they were like dead birds. One could take them up and carry them about,
and they would not wake. In cold weather she often wrapped one up in a
piece of flannel and laid him in a soft, warm place, and he never
stirred till morning.
The way she got this pair of birds was interesting. She was walking in
the woods and broke a dead branch from a tree, to use for something. On
turning it over she saw a nest, and strange to say two little birds in
it. She had been holding it upside down, but they had held on so tightly
that they did not fall out.
The lady did not know what to do. She did not want baby hummingbirds,
but she couldn't put the branch back, and she was afraid their mother
would not find them if she left them. So she took them home. She had no
trouble to feed them, and they lived with her six weeks, and died by
accident at last.
It is thought that the male ruby-throat does not come to the nest at
all, but he must have some way of knowing how things are going on. At
Mrs. Wright's summer home a mother hummingbird was killed in a
hailstorm, while young were in the nest. At once the father, or at least
a male bird, came and fed and took care of the nestlings till they flew.
In California one of the most common of this family is ANNA'S
HUMMINGBIRD. He is green, with a throat and crown of changeable colors,
lilac and red.
The nest of this bird is usually, like the ruby-throat's, of plant down
covered with lichens. But some have been found made of the blossoms of
the eucalyptus, or gum-tree. This bird is as easily tamed as the
ruby-throat, and seems to act a good deal like him.
Mrs. Grinnell found a nest in her yard in California. The mother allowed
herself to be photographed in many positions. The young ones were never
afraid, and did not mind the camera in the least. Hummingbirds never
seem to have any fear of people.
FOOTNOTE:
[20] See Appendix, 19.
XXVII
THE SWIFT FAMILY
(_Micropodidæ_)[21]
SWIFTS are curious birds, with strange habits. The one we know by sight
in the East is the chimney swift. Most like him in the West is Vaux's
swift. His ways are like the common chimney swift's, and his looks
nearly the same.
The CHIMNEY SWIFT is often called the chimney swallow, but it is very
easy to tell one from a swallow. One way is, that when a swift is flying
about over our heads, he looks as if he had no tail. The tail is very
short, not half so long as the wing. He looks more like a bat than a
bird.
Then the swift flies in a different way. A swallow soars a good deal,
that is, moves without beating the wings, a sort of gliding through the
air. But a swift beats the wings much more frequently. A swallow will
often alight on a telegraph-wire or a roof. A swift is said never to
alight except to sleep.
This bird is so much at home on wing that he even gets the twigs to make
the nest while flying. These twigs are the smallest ones on the ends of
dead branches, and are easily snapped off. The bird flies at them,
snatches one in beak or feet, breaks it off, and goes right on, without
stopping.
When he gets his twig, he carries it to a dark, sooty chimney. A queer
place for a home, surely. They used to choose a hollow tree or a cave to
live in, and that seems much nicer. But chimneys are now more plentiful
than hollow trees. And besides, they are nearer the bird's food. So
chimney homes are now the fashion in the swift family.
To make a swift nest, the twigs are glued to the chimney in the shape of
a little bracket. The glue is the saliva of the bird, which is gummy,
and gets hard as it dries, and looks like isinglass.
The mouth of a chimney swift is very odd. You have heard of "stretching
a mouth from ear to ear." That's just what the swift does every time he
opens his. It needs to be big, for he gathers up his food in it. While
he is flying around in the air, he is busy catching tiny flying
creatures, such as flies and beetles, and thus keeping the air clear for
us.
The tail of this bird is another queer thing. It has no soft feathery
tips like most birds' tails. It ends in sharp spines, like needles.
These are most useful to brace him against the rough chimney where he
sleeps. These spines are really the stiff shafts or stems of the
feathers, sticking out beyond the plumey part.
The chimney swift hangs himself up to sleep. He fastens his sharp claws
into the rough bricks, and props himself firmly with his spiny tail.
Even when the young swift is but two weeks old, he crawls out of the
nest and hangs himself up under it. He seems to like that for a change
from forever lying in a narrow bracket.
Chimney swifts are social birds. They can't bear to be alone. They are
almost always seen flying about in small parties, and calling to each
other as they go, a strange, chattering cry. They are of a sooty color
suitable to their sooty home, and the pair are alike. Vaux's swift is a
little smaller and paler than the common chimney swift.
The young swift is longer in his nursery than any bird of his size in
the United States. He is four weeks old before he ventures out of his
grimy home, though before that he will come up to the door to be fed.
A late writer in a newspaper tells a little story showing the affection
of a chimney swift for her little one. The writer had watched all summer
a party of swifts who lived in one of his chimneys. A month or more
after he supposed that all had flown away to the South beyond our
southern boundary, where they spend the winter, he heard the twittering
of one in the chimney. He took out the fireboard and found there a young
bird. He was full grown and able to fly, but he was fastened by a
horsehair to the nest. This had been pulled off by his weight, and lay
on the hearth, holding him prisoner.
The little fellow seemed to know he was to be helped, for he lay still
while the man looked to see what was the matter. His mother soon came
into the chimney with food. She took her place beside the man and
waited, while he cut the strong hair and set the nestling free.
Then the old bird went to work to teach him to fly. It was an hour or
more before he learned to use his wings. As soon as he did, the two
started off on their lonely journey to the far South, to join their
friends who had been gone so long. How I wish we could know that they
reached them.
Insects were about gone when this happened, and this swift mother would
have died if she had stayed, but she would not leave her little one to
starve.
It is a beautiful thing to see a large flock of swifts go to bed. If
they all rushed in pell-mell, they might hurt one another. They begin by
flying around high above the chimney in great circles. As they go around
they sink lower, and the circles get smaller till it looks like an
immense whirling funnel. When the birds forming the lower part of the
funnel reach the top of the chimney, they plunge in. So in a short time
the whole flock is in and no one hurt.
FOOTNOTE:
[21] See Appendix, 20.
XXVIII
THE GOATSUCKER FAMILY
(_Caprimulgidæ_)[22]
THESE are queer-looking birds, having their front toes tied together by
a kind of webbing, and almost no hind toe at all. The mouth, too, is
almost as odd as the toes. It has a short beak, but is very wide, and it
opens from ear to ear like the swift's. The plumage is so soft that the
birds can fly without making the least sound.
The two most common goatsuckers are the whip-poor-will and the
nighthawk. They are both as large as a robin, and stouter. They are
dressed in dull brown, and black and white, mottled all over. If you
just glanced at the two, you might think them alike. But they are not
marked alike, and all their ways are so different that there is no
trouble in telling them apart.
The WHIP-POOR-WILL has broad white tailmarks, with stripes on the back,
and a narrow white band across the breast. He comes out only in the
evening, and he flies low, without making a sound. He rests lengthwise
of a log or fence, not across it as most birds do. His feet are too
short to clasp a perch.
On his log or fence the whip-poor-will sits and sings while he waits for
his supper. You all know his song, his lively "whip-poor-will" over and
over many times. It is a delightful evening sound, which I love to hear.
It is said that his notes have been counted, and he has been found to
repeat them several hundred times without stopping.
When moths or other creatures which fly in the night come along, he
catches them in his big mouth. But he is not obliged always to wait.
Sometimes he flies near the ground like a shadow, looking for prey, and
he often hops awkwardly along the road, for the same purpose. He picks
up straggling insects, and in the West locusts.
The whip-poor-will mother makes no nest. She finds a little hollow in
the ground, among leaves or near bushes in the woods, and that's good
enough for her nestlings. She lays two eggs, speckled and mottled so
that they look like the ground and leaves around them. She looks almost
the same herself. You might walk close to her and not see her.
When young whip-poor-wills come out of the egg, they are dressed in
speckled gray down. They cuddle down quietly by their mother, and the
whole family is hard to see. When their eyes are shut, they look almost
exactly like the earth and leaves among which they lie.
If a whip-poor-will nest is disturbed, the mother will pretend to be
badly hurt. She will tumble about on the ground and cry like the whine
of a young puppy, trying to coax away the one she fears. If she is too
much alarmed, she will clasp her young one between her feet and fly away
with it.
Instead of the common whip-poor-will of the Northern and Middle States,
the South has the CHUCK-WILL'S-WIDOW, who is somewhat larger. The West
has the POOR-WILL, or the NUTTALL'S WHIP-POOR-WILL, who is rather
smaller and paler than either. The habits of all are about the same.
They are called solitary birds. That is, they are not found in parties
like swallows or crows. They do not sing or call when flying.
These birds are hard to watch because they come out in the dark, and can
then see so much better than we can. So we know little about their
ways.
The NIGHTHAWK'S looks, and all his ways, are different. He wears the
same colors that the whip-poor-will does, but they are arranged in
another way. They are put in bars running across the back and tail, and
there is a great deal of white on his upper breast. On the wing is a
large white spot that looks like a hole across it, when you see him
flying away up in the air. You can always know him by this.
[Illustration: NIGHTHAWK]
Then he does not act like the whip-poor-will. He is a high flyer,
sailing about over our heads in the afternoon or evening. He is not
silent on the wing. Now and then he gives a strange sharp cry like
"peent." He is busy catching flies and mosquitoes as he goes. Sometimes
you will see him dive head first toward the earth as if he would dash
himself against it. At the same time he makes a loud sound, like blowing
into the bunghole of an empty barrel. But before he touches, he turns
and skims along just above the ground.
The mother nighthawk, like the whip-poor-will, makes no nest. She
chooses a sunny spot in a pasture or on a hillside to put her eggs.
Sometimes in the cities, where flies and other things to eat are so
plentiful, she takes a flat house-roof for her nursery. Many pairs of
down-covered baby night hawks are brought up over our heads, and we
do not know it.
* * * * *
The family name of Goatsuckers was given to the birds from the foolish
notion that they took milk from the goats. By watching them, it has been
found that when they are so busy around the goats or cattle, they are
really catching the insects which torment them. So they are doing a
kindness to the beasts, instead of an injury.
FOOTNOTE:
[22] See Appendix, 21.
XXIX
THE WOODPECKER FAMILY
(_Picidæ_)[23]
YOU may generally know a woodpecker the moment you see him on a tree. He
will--if he follows woodpecker fashions--be clinging to the trunk, or a
big branch, propped up by his stiff tail, and not perched crosswise like
most other birds.
There are a good many of this family in the world. We have twenty-four
species in North America. They differ from other birds in two or three
ways. First their toes are always in pairs, two turned forward and two
turned backward, except in one genus, which has but three toes. So they
can hold on better than anybody else.
Then again the tails of woodpeckers are not like most birds' tails. They
are strong and stiff, so that they can be used as props to hold the bird
in the queer position he likes so well.
Oddest of all are the woodpecker tongues. They are round, worm-shaped it
is called, and except in the genus of sapsuckers, very long. They can be
pushed out far beyond the end of the beak. That is so that they can
reach into a deep hole for the insects they eat. They have little barbs
or sharp points on the tip, to catch their prey, and they are sticky
besides. The tongue of the sapsucker has a brush at the end and is not
barbed.
One of the most notable things about a woodpecker is his bill, which he
uses as a drill and also to drum with.
Woodpeckers are made to take care of the large limbs and trunks of
trees, to get out from under the bark the grubs which would kill them.
They are perfectly fitted for the work.
As you learn more about birds and beasts, you will see that every one is
exactly fitted for his work in life. A worm is as well fitted to be a
worm as a bird is to be a bird. How this came to be so has long been a
study of the wise men, and they have not found out all about it yet.
The largest of this family that is common is the GOLDEN-WINGED
WOODPECKER, or FLICKER. He is as large as a pigeon. In the Eastern
States is the golden-wing, in the West and California the red-shafted,
who differs merely in the dress.
The gold-winged woodpecker has a brown back with black bars, and a light
breast with heavy black spots. His wings and tail are yellow on the
inside. He has a bright red collar on the back of his neck, a heavy
black crescent on his breast, and black cheek patches or bars running
down from the corners of his mouth.
The RED-SHAFTED FLICKER has red cheek patches instead of black, and
omits the red collar altogether. His breast is a little grayer, and the
wing and tail linings are scarlet. Both flickers have large white spots
on the back, above the tail, which show very plainly when they fly.
These two varieties of the flicker are found from the Atlantic to the
Pacific. Their ways of living are the same, and what is said of one will
do as well for the other.
A flicker hangs himself up to sleep. He takes a good hold of a tree
trunk, or upright limb, with his grapnel-shaped toes, presses his stiff
tail against the bark, and hangs there all night. When he flies, he goes
in great waves, as if he were galloping through the air.
The nest of this woodpecker is a snug little room in a tree trunk, or
sometimes a telegraph-pole. He usually selects a tree that is dead, or
partly so, but sometimes he takes a solid one. The little room is cut
out by the strong, sharp beaks of the pair. The door of this home is
just a round hole rather high up on the trunk. A passage is cut straight
in for a little way and then turns down, and there the room is made. It
has to be of pretty good size, for the bird is fond of a large family.
Five or six and occasionally more young flickers have been found in a
nest.
Fashions change in the bird world as well as in the human. Woodpeckers
more than any others are changing their habits, and improving their
condition. They have found an easier way to get a home than to chisel it
out of wood. Nowadays woodpeckers often cut a hole through a board which
admits them into a garret, a church tower, or the walls of an unused
building, and make the nest there. Thus they save themselves much labor.
One even cut out a home in a haystack.
These birds have changed too, it is said, in their notions about eating.
They do not think it necessary to dig out every mouthful from under tree
bark. The flicker feeds on the ground. He eats many insects, but mostly
ants. When insects are scarce, he eats many wild berries--dogwood, black
alder, poke-berries, and others--and the seeds of weeds.
Young woodpeckers in the nest are fed mostly upon insects. When they get
big enough to climb up to the door of their snug home, they stick their
heads out and call for something to eat. Then one can hardly pass
through the woods without hearing them, for they have good loud voices.
And of course they are always hungry.
The way they are fed is by regurgitation. That is, the old bird swallows
the food she gets, and when she wants to feed, she jerks it up again.
She thrusts her bill far down the little one's throat, as I told you the
hummingbird does. Then she gives three or four pokes as if she were
hammering it down. A young flicker does not seem to know how to swallow.
A lady once picked up a nestling who was hurt, and to get him to eat
anything she had to poke it down his throat herself.
The gold-winged woodpecker is a lively bird, most interesting to know.
He makes so many strange noises that I can't tell you half of them, and
his ways are as queer as his notes. He does not sing much, but he is a
great drummer. When he finds a tin roof, or eaves gutter that pleases
him, he will drum on it till he drives the family nearly crazy. He seems
particularly to delight in waking them all up in the morning.
He can sing, too. I have heard a flicker sing a droll little song, not
very loud, swinging his body from side to side as he did it.
Another thing this bird can do is dance. Two flickers will stand
opposite one another and take funny little steps, forward and back, and
sideways. Then they will touch their bills together and go through
several graceful figures. This has been seen several times by persons
whose truthfulness can be relied upon.
The RED-HEADED WOODPECKER is another common one of the family,
especially in the Middle States. He is a little smaller than the
flicker. No one can mistake this bird, he is so plainly marked. His
whole head is bright red. The rest of him is black, or bluish black,
with a large mass of white on the body and wings.
This woodpecker, too, has partly given up getting food from under the
bark. He takes a good deal on the wing, like a flycatcher. Sometimes he
goes to the ground for a large insect like a cricket or grasshopper, and
he is fond of nuts, especially the little three-cornered beech-nut.
The red-head is beginning to store food for winter use, for most
woodpeckers do not migrate. When beech-nuts are ripe, he gets great
quantities of them, and packs them away in queer places, where he can
find them when he wants them.
Some of his nuts the red-head puts in cavities in trees, others in
knot-holes or under bark that is loose. Many he fits into cracks in the
bark, and hammers in tight. He has been known to fill the cracks in a
gate-post, and in railroad ties, and even to poke his nuts between the
shingles on a roof. Any place where he can wedge a nut in he seems to
think is a good one.
[Illustration: DOWNY WOODPECKER]
A woodpecker can eat almost anything. Besides insects and nuts, he likes
wild berries of all kinds--dogwood, cedar, and others that he finds in
the woods.
The nest of the red-headed woodpecker is usually cut out in the dead top
or limb of a tree. In prairie lands, where trees are scarce, he contents
himself with telegraph-poles and fence-posts.
This bird is rather a dainty feeder. He does not swallow his food
wherever he finds it, as many birds do. He likes a regular dining-table.
So he takes it to some place on top of a fence-post or an old stump,
where he has found or made a little hollow. There he puts his nut or
acorn, picks it to pieces, and eats it in bits.
The young red-head is a good deal like his father, only his head is
brown instead of red. A queer thing happened to a baby red-head in
Indiana one summer. He was found on the ground, hopping about in a
pitiful way, unable to fly. The parents and others of the woodpecker
tribe were flying about him, much troubled, and trying to help him. But
this young one had been hurt, or was not yet strong enough to get about.
He acted as if he were half paralyzed, and he was wholly helpless. Once
while the little bird was hobbling about and calling for something to
eat, and no one was there to feed him, a robin happened to notice him.
He took pity on the hungry baby, and brought him a nice worm, which he
took very gladly.