Three North American species, known as Sap-suckers, have the curious habit of piercing the boles of trees for the purpose of procuring the sap which flows copiously when the tree is so "tapped." Another species of the same region seems to be possessed of a persistent dread of famine, storing up immense quantities of nuts, which it appears never afterwards to use. These nuts are tightly fixed into holes in the bark of trees, and in such numbers that "a large pine 40 or 50 feet high will present the appearance of being closely studded with brass nails, the heads only being visible."
The Wrynecks differ from the Woodpeckers mainly in that the tail-feathers are soft instead of spiny. Although sombre, the plumage is yet very beautiful, having a velvety appearance, variegated with pearl-grey, powdered or dusted over a general groundwork of nut-brown, buff, and grey. Bars and fine lines add still more to the general effect, and render description still more difficult. One species is common in England. It is known also as the Cuckoo's Mate and the Snake-bird. The former name is given in allusion to the fact that it arrives with the cuckoo, the latter from its strange habit of writhing its head and neck, and also on account of its curious hissing note, made when disturbed on its nest. It has the long, worm-like tongue of the woodpecker, but without a barbed tip.
The habit of writhing the head and neck often serves the wryneck in good stead. Nesting in a hole in a tree, escape is difficult so soon as the discoverer has come to close quarters. The untried egg-collector, for instance, peering down into the nest, and seeing nothing distinctly, but only a moving head, and hearing a hissing sound, imagines the hole to be tenanted by a snake, and beats a hasty retreat, only to catch a glimpse, a moment later, of the bird hurrying out of its perilous hiding-place. Should he, however, discovering the true state of affairs, put down his hand and seize the bird, it will adopt yet other resources. Clinging tightly to its captor's finger, it will ruffle up its feathers, stretch out its neck, and at the same time move it jerkily and stiffly about, and finally, closing its eyes, hang downwards, as if dead. Then, before the puzzled captor has had time to realise what has happened, it loosens its hold and takes instant flight.
The young are easily, though rarely, tamed, and form extremely interesting pets, feeding readily from the hand, and affording endless amusement by their remarkable manner of capturing flies and other insects; but they do not appear to live long in confinement.
The wryneck is one of the few birds which will persistently go on laying eggs, no matter how many times they may be stolen from the nest. A case is on record where as many as forty-two were laid in a single summer by one bird—an exceedingly cruel experiment.
Photo by C. Reid, Wishaw. Printed at Lyons, France.
WAXBILLS.
Waxbills are relatives of the Weaver birds, and take their name from the waxen appearance of the beak which is coral red.
