Little Brothers of the Air

by Olive Thorne Miller

The best place I have found for spying upon the habits of birds is behind a blind. If one can command a window with outside blinds, looking upon a spot attractive to the feathered world, he will be sure, sooner or later, to see every bird of the vicinity. If he will keep the blinds closed and look only through the opened slats, he will witness more of their unconstrained free ways than can possibly be seen by a person within their sight, though he assume the attitude and the stolidity of a wooden figure. Says our nature-poet, Emerson:—

"You often thread the woods in vain
To see what singer piped the strain.
Seek not, and the little eremite
Flies forth and gayly sings in sight."

And the bird student can testify to the truth of the verse.

Many times, after having spent the morning in wandering about in the bird haunts of a neighborhood, I have returned to my room to write up my note-book, and have seen more of birds and bird life in an hour from my window than during the whole morning's stroll.

One of my windows, last summer, looked out upon an ideal bird corner: a bit of grass, uncut till very late, with a group of trees and shrubs at the lower boundary, and an old board fence, half buried in luxuriant wild raspberry bushes, running along one side. It was a neglected spot, the side yard of a farmhouse; and I was careful not to enter it myself so often as to suggest to the birds that they were likely to see people. It had the further advantage of being so near the woods surrounding the house, that the shy forest birds were attracted to it.

No sooner would I seat myself, pen in hand, than chirps and twitters would come from the trees, a bird alight on the fence, or a red squirrel come out to sun himself. Of course the pen gave way to the opera-glass in a moment, and often not a line of the note-book got itself written till birds and squirrels had gone to bed with the sun.

The group of trees which bounded my view at the end of this outdoor study I called the "locust group." It consisted of a locust or two, surrounded by a small but close growth of lesser trees and shrubs that made a heavy mass of foliage. There were a few young ashes, two or three half-grown maples, a shadberry bush, and wild raspberry vines to carry the varied foliage to the ground. Inside this beautiful tangle of Nature's own arranging, was a perfect tent, so thickly grown near the ground that a person could hardly penetrate it without an axe, but open and roomy above, with branches and twigs enough to accommodate an army of birds. Behind that waving green curtain of leaves took place many dramas I longed to see; but I knew that my appearance there would be a signal for the whole scene to vanish, and with flit of wings the dramatis personæ to make their exit. So I tried to possess my soul in patience, and to content myself with the flashes and glimpses I could catch through an opening here and there in the leafy drapery.

At one corner of the group stood a small dead tree. This was the phœbe's customary perch, and on those bare branches—first or last—every visitor was sure to appear. On the lower branch the robin paused, with worm in mouth, on the way to his two-story nest under the eaves of the barn. On the top spire the warbler baby sat and stared at the world about it, till its anxious parent could coax it to a more secluded perch. From a side branch the veery poured his wonderful song, and the cheery little song sparrow uttered his message of good will for all to hear and heed. Here the red-headed woodpecker waited, with low "k-r-r-r-r" and many bows to the universe in general, to see if the way were clear for him to go to the fence. Nothing is so good to bring birds into sight as an old fence or a dead tree. On the single leafless branch at the top of an old apple-tree the student will generally see, at one time or another, every bird in an orchard.

This dead tree of the locust group was the regular perch of "the loneliest of its kind," the phœbe, whose big chuckle-head and high shoulders gave him the look of an old man, bent with age. His outline one could never mistake, even though he were but a silhouette against the sky. One of these birds could nearly always be seen on the lowest branch pursuing his business of fly-catcher, and I learned more of the singularly reserved creature than I ever knew before. I found, contrary to my expectation, that he had a great deal to say for himself, aside from the professional performance at the peak of the barn roof which gives him his name.

"Phœbe is all it has to say
In plaintive cadence o'er and o'er,"