"AGAIN THE PLUCKY LITTLE BUNTING SET ITS WINGS AND LOWERED ITS HEAD."
Tiny was not always full of fight. He formed a friendship for a young towhee-bunting after a singular encounter. The bunting was eating from a loaf of bread, which was staked down in the dooryard, when Tiny appeared. The squirrel thought that the bird would run away, but instead, the latter set its wings and lowered its head in preparation for battle. Tiny was astonished. He sat up, folded his forepaws on his breast, and looked on the gamy little bunting with wide-eyed wonder. The bunting soon turned to the bread. Tiny brought his forepaws down hard on the ground, evidently to frighten the bird. Again the plucky little bunting set its wings and lowered its head. Again Tiny sat up and looked the little fellow over. This time there was a comical expression on the face of the squirrel that said as plain as words could tell that he appreciated the situation. That he admired the pluck of the bunting was evident by his action. He crept quietly to the opposite side of the loaf of bread, and allowed the bunting to eat unmolested. After this the two would eat together whenever they chanced to be in the dooryard at the same time.
Tiny did not allow other buntings near his food, and I thought he would forget his bird friend when the buntings returned in the spring migration, but not so. He knew his friend at once, and chuckled some kind of a greeting, while the bunting said something in bird language that seemed to my ears to express joy.
The red squirrel is quick-witted and full of resources. If new and unusual conditions confront him he is equal to the occasion. I have had proof of this hundreds of times.
I will relate one instance: I feed hemp-seed to the birds. The red squirrels and chipmunks are fond of the seed, and unless I stand guard, will manage to get the lion's share. The chipmunks stuff their pouched cheeks, and would carry away a bushel every day if it was fed to them.
When Tiny is present, no squirrel or chipmunk dares to meddle with the food. He does not molest the birds, and I really think that he knows that the seeds belong to them.
Last fall I placed a wire netting over a shallow box, so the birds could pick out seeds, while the squirrels could not get their noses through the mesh. The chipmunks were puzzled, and one after another gave up in disgust, to fall back on bread and corn. When Tiny found the box he got mad all through. He crowded his nose against the wire netting, biting savagely meanwhile. I laughed, and Tiny instantly stopped his efforts and looked in my direction. All at once he got the idea into his head that I had blocked his game, and had caused the trouble. In three bounds he landed on the trunk of a pine-tree, and running to a limb just over my head, he told me in wicked squirrel language just what he thought of me. In his anger he pounded the limb with his hind feet, stopping now and then to charge down the tree-trunk, as if he were about to attack me.
