A-Birding on a Bronco

by Florence Merriam Bailey

The next day I heard the titmouse singing in an elder by the kitchen, and went out to see how the birds acted when gathering their own material. The songster was idly hunting through the branches, singing, while his mate—busy little housewife—was hard at work getting her building stuff. She had something in her beak when I caught sight of her, but in an instant was down on the ground after another bit. Then she flew up in the tree looking among the leaves; in passing she swung a moment on a strap hanging from a branch; then flew down among the weeds, back up in the tree again; and so back and forth, over and over, her bill getting fuller and fuller.

I was glad to save her work, and interested to see how far she would accept my help. Once when I blocked the entrance with feathers and horsehair she stopped, and, though her bill was full, picked up the packet and flew out on a branch with it. Was she going to throw away my present? For a moment my faith in her was shaken. Perhaps her mate had been warning her to beware of me. She did drop the mat of horsehair—what did such a dainty Quaker lady as she want of horsehair?—but she kept tight hold of one of the feathers, although it was almost as big as she was; and flew back quickly to the nest with it.

This performance proved one point. She would not take everything that was brought to her. She preferred to hunt for her own materials rather than use what she did not like. Now the question was, what did she like?

My next experiment was with some lamp wick to which I had tied bits of cotton. The titmouse took the cotton and would have taken the wicking, I think, if it had not been fastened in too tight for her. After that I tried tying bits of cotton to strings, and letting them dangle before the mouth of the nest. Though I moved up to within twenty feet of the nest, she paid no attention to me but hurried in. She liked the cotton so well she stopped in her hallway, reached up to pull at the white bundles, and tweaked and tugged till, finally, she backed triumphantly down the hole with one.

Her mate, less familiar with my experiments, started to go to the nest after her, but the sight of the cotton scared him so he fled ignominiously back into the treetop. He stayed there singing till she came out, when he flew up to her with a dainty he had discovered—at least the two put their bills together; perhaps it was just a caress, for they were a tender, gentle little pair.

Having proved that my bird liked feathers and cotton, I wanted to see what she thought of straws. Apparently she did not think much of them. She looked very much dashed when she came home and found the yellow sticks protruding from the nest hole. She hesitated, turned her head over, flew to a twig on one side of the oak and then back to one on the other side. Finally she mustered courage, and with her crest flattened as if she did not like it, darted down into the hole. When she flew out, however, she went right to her mate, and forgetting all her troubles at sight of him, fluttered her wings and lisped like a young bird as she put up her bill to have him feed her.

Perhaps it was unkind to bother the poor bird any more, but I meant her no harm and the fever for experiment possessed my blood. I tied some of the straws to a piece of wicking and baited it with feathers, thinking that perhaps she would take the straws for the sake of the feathers and wicking. I also stuffed the hole with horsehair. She did pull at the feather end of the line; I saw the straw jerk, and, when she had left, found a round hole the brave little bird had made right through the middle of the mat of horsehair I had stopped the nest with.

Straws and horsehair the titmouse evidently classed together. They were not on her list of building materials. On reflection she decided that the horsehair would make a good hall carpet, so left it in the vestibule, though she would have none of it down in her nest; but she calmly threw my straws down on the ground at the foot of the oak.

I don't know what experiments I might have been tempted to try next had I not suddenly found myself dismissed—the house was complete. My pretty Quaker lady sat in the shade of the oak leaves with crest raised and the flickering sunlight flecking her gray breast. She pecked softly at one of the white feathers that blew up against her as she listened to the song of her mate; and then flew away to him without once going to the nest. Evidently her work was done, and she was waiting till it should be time to begin brooding.

Ten days later I saw her mate come with his bill full of worms and lean down by the hole to call her. She answered with a sweet pleading twitter, and reached up to be fed. When he had gone, perhaps she thought she would like a second bite. At any rate, she hopped out in the doorway and flew off to another tree, calling out tsché-de-de so sweetly he would surely have come back to her had he been within hearing.