The continuous "chip-chip-chip-chip-chip-chip——" of the chipping sparrow, like a toy insect that must run down before it can stop, is always a welcome sound at this time of the year. He can easily be tamed to take food from one's hand. Although a neat nest-builder, "chippy" selects poor nesting sites, and often the wind upsets his hair-lined cup and destroys the eggs or young.
April Seventeenth
At first the song of the spring peeper, which is really a frog, is heard only in the evening, but as the days get warmer, a perfect chorus of piping voices comes from swamps and stagnant pools. He strongly objects to singing before an audience, but it is well worth one's while to wait patiently and catch him in the act of inflating the skin beneath his chin.
April Eighteenth
On account of its tufted head, and clear, ringing song, "peto, peto, peto, peto" or "de, de, de, de," much like a chickadee (Chapman) the tufted titmouse is a well-known bird throughout its range: eastern United States, from northern New Jersey, and southern Iowa to the plains.
Notes
April Nineteenth
Where is the country boy or girl who does not know the "woolly bear," or "porcupine caterpillar," the chunky, hairy, rufous and black-banded caterpillar, that curls up when touched and does not uncoil until danger is over? They are the larvæ of the Isabella moth, and the reason for their appearance on the railroad tracks and wagon roads, is that they have just finished hibernating and are now looking for a suitable place to retire and change to chrysalides and then into moths.