Our Bird Comrades

by Leander S. Keyser

Of great assistance to the pedestrian is a light cane. In climbing Pikes Peak one evening after dark, I doubt whether I should have been able to gain the summit had it not been for my tough little wild-cherry cane, upon which I could lean when almost exhausted, which supported my faltering steps, and which happily never grew weary. Two years later it helped me to scale a number of snow-capped mountains, among them Grays Peak and Peak Number Eight of the Ten Mile Range. Indeed, my little cane was of so much service to me that I came to look upon it as a personal friend that cared almost as much for me as I did for it. It pushed aside thorny bushes and nettlesome weeds when I was looking for nests, thus saving my hands many a painful wound. And more than one serpent, including the rattlesnake, has had his head crushed or his spine broken by sturdy blows from my little wild-cherry cane. I should add that it had a hooked handle, so that I could hang it on the strap of my haversack when I needed both hands.

In the beginning of your observations you will find the work of identifying the birds a rare and exciting pleasure; then, after you have named all the species in your neighborhood, it will be no less delightful to study their interesting ways, or to extend your researches to other fields. And if at any time you observe some odd bits of bird behavior which you think will be news to the many bird lovers the world over, why should you not report them to one of the bird magazines, so that others may share the pleasures of your discoveries? An admirer of feathered folk should not be selfish; indeed, I do not see how he can be.

It simply remains to be said that this volume is an illustration of the method of bird study just indicated. In the first place, I shall show, in a few chapters, how the student goes about his work of identifying species and making new bird friends; then will follow a number of monographs indicating how much may be learned about the life histories of several interesting species; next there will be a miscellaneous collection of incidents of bird life, showing how many odds and ends the industrious and observing rambler may gather by the way; and, finally, the book will conclude with four somewhat technical chapters on bird education, bird music, bird flight, and bird feet, which I hope will prove interesting as well as instructive.

MAKING NEW FRIENDS

A friend once told me of a letter he had received from a correspondent who is an enthusiastic botanist. The writer, having just returned from an excursion in which he found a flower that was new to him, gave vent to his feelings of exultation by exclaiming, "Oh, the joy! the joy!" A like experience comes to the bird lover when he makes a new acquaintance in the feathered domain, no matter how many other observers may have seen and studied the species. "A bird that is new to me is to all intents and purposes a new bird," is his self-complacent mode of reasoning, though it may not be distinguished for its logic.

After studying the birds in Ohio and Indiana for a good many years, I moved to eastern Kansas, where I lived for five and a half years. My rambles were by no means confined to the wooded bluffs and hollows that bound the Missouri River on the west, for I also made excursions out upon the prairies of Kansas, over into the state of Missouri, and down into Oklahoma; and everywhere I carried my field glass with me and kept both eyes intent on the birds. You would expect an enthusiast in the pursuit of bird lore to do nothing else. What a pleasure it was to ramble about in new fields and make acquaintance with new bird friends! There is not a very marked difference between the avifauna of eastern Kansas and Ohio, and yet there are some birds found in the former state that are not met with in the latter—enough to keep the observer on the tiptoe of expectancy for several months.

One of my new acquaintances was a little bird which is known as the clay-colored sparrow. It belongs to the same genus (Spizella) as the chipping and field sparrows which are so well known in the East; but it has an individuality of its own, and is not merely a copy. I stumbled upon it while pursuing my explorations near Peabody, far out on the level prairie, where the species was abundant during the season of migration. As I was sauntering along a road, a peculiar croaking little trill greeted me from the hedge, sounding very much like the rasping call of certain kinds of grasshoppers when they are suddenly startled and take to wing. But no insect had ever emitted quite such a sound in my hearing. This could not be an insect. It was worth while to look and make sure of the identity of the odd musician.