Home › Volumes › Bird Homes › Introductory

Introductory — Part 4

But I must remind all readers that any one who does keep pets incurs responsibilities along with the pleasure they bring. To deprive any wild animal of its liberty and then neglect it is sheer barbarity.

Having birds in this way affords almost the only means of studying the remarkable individuality possessed by different members of the same species. That each bird has a character peculiar to itself may be doubted by some, but I have never seen two individuals showing the same peculiarities. Two rose-breasted grosbeaks that have been reared together from the same nest, and are now eighteen months old, are different in almost every way. One is intensely jealous and objects to attention being paid to any other bird; the other seems not to know what jealousy means. One wants to sleep at night; the other keeps up a perpetual jumping from perch to perch until all hours. The female (who has most of the bad traits) never lets her mate have any little tid-bit in the way of food; no matter how much she has, she immediately seizes whatever is given to her better-natured companion. So it is with all the other birds; one will be naturally wild and timid; another knows no fear; one, though tame, cannot endure being touched; another, like a bluebird I have, wants to be handled most of the time, and is quite content if allowed to sit quietly (and go to sleep) inside a partly closed hand.

The method of eating adopted by each of the birds is quite individual. The wood thrush makes rapid and regular dips into the food-cup, taking only a small mouthful each time, but repeating the operation until its hunger is satisfied; feeding takes place at rather long intervals. The yellow-breasted chat feeds somewhat after the same manner, but is not so quick or so dainty in its movements, and eats more frequently. The mocking-bird eats often and much, but does not draw his beak away from the cup between each mouthful. The bluebird eats fairly frequently and dips his beak into the food with a sharp jerk, pausing a second or two between each mouthful, and making a snap with his beak every time he takes the food. If given a live grasshopper, he carefully kills it, then shakes off its legs and swallows the entire body, afterwards gathering up the legs. The Baltimore oriole seems to chew his food, and eats very frequently; if given anything, either eatable or otherwise, he holds it, hawk-fashion, with his feet (or foot) and quickly picks it to pieces, usually prying it apart with his sharply pointed beak. The rose-breasted grosbeaks eat nearly all the time, even late at night, and I fancy this accounts for their tendency to become very fat when in captivity. So it may be seen that each bird is a study by itself.

Undoubtedly this same individuality exists in birds when in their wild state, perhaps even to a greater degree, but it is more difficult to discover. Some nests show individual peculiarities, but whether the same bird builds the same kind of nest each year is, of course, unknown.

The object of this book, I may repeat, is to stimulate the love of birds; and though descriptions of nests and eggs are given, as well as instructions for egg-collecting, it must be borne in mind that it is generally neither necessary nor advisable that collections of eggs should be made. Remember that, as Mr. Frank Chapman says, the two points of interest in a bird's egg are "what the egg is in and what is in the egg." Much more knowledge may be gained by observing the birds themselves throughout the breeding season than by taking the eggs. Leave egg-collecting to those who are able, through scientific study, to make use of such collections and devote your leisure hours to the far more interesting process of collecting knowledge which will lend increased interest to your every-day existence and give you new insight into the fascinating world of bird-life.