Birds and All Nature, Vol. VI, No. 5, December 1899

Various

Birds and All Nature, Vol. VI, No. 5, December 1899 / Illustrated by Color Photography

THE TRAMPS OF BIRDLAND

ELANORA KINSLEY MARBLE

THE birds had met in council that morning, and from the great chattering and chirping I judged some very serious question was up before the board.

"Something must be done," Mr. Red-eyed Vireo was saying, as I sauntered down to the orchard and seated myself beneath an apple tree, "we have stood the imposition long enough. Every year we meet and draw up resolutions, with many 'whereases' and 'wherefores,' and 'aforesaids' – resolutions with nothing resolute about them. To-day, I say, something must be done."

Mr. Wood-thrush, Mr. Towhee, Mr. Chipping Sparrow, Mr. Yellow-breasted Chat, Mr. Song Sparrow, and several Mr. Flycatchers, beside a number of other small birds, nodded their heads in unequivocal assent.

"We have enemies enough," continued Mr. Vireo, "how many only Mother Nature knows. Even in the darkness of night we are not safe from the owls, skunks, snakes, and other robbers, and in the day-time, besides our feathered foes, we have the ruthless 'collector,' and the ever-present bad boy. Enemies without are bad enough, but to have in our very midst a – a – " Mr. Vireo paused, presumably choking with indignation, but really because he had quite forgotten what he had prepared to say.

"Hear, hear!" cried the assembled birds, making a great clamor and clatter in order that the speaker might have a chance to slyly consult his notes.

"A tribe of social outcasts – tramps, in fact," continued Mr. Vireo, "whose females, disliking the cares of family life, build no homes of their own, but instead deposit their eggs in some other bird's nest that their young may be hatched and reared without any trouble to themselves. Our mates have enough to do to bring up their own families, so I say the tribe of cowbirds must be driven from this community, or else, like the rest of us, be forced to work."

"H'm! yes," sighed Mr. Towhee, "that's what we say every year, and every year the conditions remain just the same. The cowbirds are tramps by nature, and you can't change their natures, you know."

I judged, from the great chattering and chirping, that grave exceptions were taken to this remark, but quiet at length being restored, Mr. Towhee continued:

"My mate says it depends upon ourselves whether the whole tribe shall be exterminated. She, for one, does not intend to hatch out any more of Mrs. Cowbird's babies. This spring we found one of her speckled eggs in our nest, but it wasn't hatched out, I warrant you. We simply pierced the shell with our bills, picked it up by the opening, and carried it out of the nest."

A round of applause greeted these remarks, much to Mr. Towhee's gratification.

"It strikes me," said Mr. Indigo Bunting, "that the whole fault lies with our mates. From the size and different markings of Mrs. Cowbird's eggs they can always be distinguished from their own. No self-respecting bird should ever brood one; in that way we can exterminate the race."

"'Tis the mother-instinct, I presume," said Mr. Vireo, "or the kindly nature of some females, not to neglect a forlorn little egg abandoned by its parents at their very door. Ah," he broke off, pointing in a certain direction, "is not that a sad sight for an affectionate husband to see?"

On a fence near by stood two birds – a very small one, with a worried, harassed air, endeavoring upon tip-toe to drop into the mouth of the great fat baby towering above her a green caterpillar which she held in her bill.

"That is Mrs. Vireo, my mate, and her foster child," continued the speaker. "The egg of the cowbird being larger than her own, received all the warmth of her breast, so that her own little ones perished in the shell. It takes all her time and strength to feed that great hulking baby, who will accept her nursing long after he can take care of himself, then desert her to join his own tribe in the grai