You see, therefore, that the birds will trust us when they learn that we are their friends. If you would encourage them to make their home near yours, you might provide little boxes for them to occupy or make holes in hollow limbs where they can place their nests.
They enjoy, too, a trough of water in which they can bathe. When winter comes a piece of tallow in the trees will prove a rich treat to the chickadee, and a few seeds scattered on the snow will make a feast for the hardy snowbirds.
[Illustration with caption: Bird-house. Made from a bark-covered log, 8 inches long and 8 inches in diameter, a hole 5 inches in diameter "being bored from end to end, leaving an outer wall 1 1/2 inches thick."—From "Bird-Lore" by permission of The Macmillan Company.]
FEATHERED TRAVELERS.
Some birds are great travelers. They may pass the summer in the Arctic regions and in the autumn go to Patagonia to spend the winter. Is it not wonderful how they can make this long journey without a compass or map to guide them?
Generally they follow rivers or coast lines; but they may have to cross large bodies of water where no land can be seen Still they find their way to and fro, returning each year to the same place Sometimes they even use the nest they built the year before.
Large birds and those which can fly swiftly, like swallows, are not afraid to travel by day. But the little birds, like wrens and warblers, that live in the shelter of trees and bushes, wait for the night.
They are not afraid of the dark. It hides them from their enemies. So when the sun has gone down and night comes, they fly up into the air and start on their journey.
If you should look through a telescope at the moon some clear night in spring or autumn, you could probably see the birds flying by. They look like bees going across the face of the moon.
Large birds, like ducks, fly very swiftly. It is thought that they may travel one hundred miles an hour. But the small warblers and flycatchers go less than half as fast.