Third, I am glad because I have since read in the bird books that the chimney swift is a very useful bird; that he feeds wholly on troublesome insects.
Fourth, I am glad because it gave me opportunity to get acquainted with one more bird. I consider that something worth while.
A ROBIN’S NEST
VIII
BIRDS NOT OF A FEATHER
One day, on looking up into a tree in the vacant lot, what should I see there? A mother robin just dropping a worm into her baby’s open beak.
The nest was right in the crotch where the trunk forks into two main branches. So many robins’ nests are blown off the branches by the wind, or washed off by heavy rains, that I was glad to see this nest firmly saddled on that strong trunk. But a second thought told me that it was easy for cats and squirrels to get at, so I studied how to make it safe.
All the tin sheeting had been used up; but I knew where there was some old stove pipe. A kind neighbor ripped it open. One piece was not wide enough to go around the tree, so I had to use two. Mrs. Cotton, who had again become my neighbor, having built a bungalow on one of the vacant lots, came to help me. She said it wasn’t good for the tree to drive nails into it, and fetched some wire. Meanwhile, I got the stepladder; for the sheeting must be high enough so that cats and squirrels cannot jump from the ground to the trunk above it. We used only two small nails, to keep the wires from slipping.
Of course, the robins scolded while we were doing this. They never liked to have anybody near their tree.
After a week the young ones were sitting on the edge of the nest. I knew then that they would soon leave it, and I began to keep a close watch on them, and on the cats of the neighborhood.