The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-03-05
Children'S Column.
GUESTS IN WINTER WOODS,

0"AAJ SAdAlngS from the table-ClOth
outside the kitchen door, will give
the veriest forest hermit comnanv
throughout the stormieset winter.
Fol- the crested Tits, in buff vests.
Mapped like Continentals, will steal
the nuts, pierce some with their
pointed bills, peck out savory break
tasts and hide the rest in tree
crOtches and bark crannies with con-
hiding simplicity that there they will
stay for future use. But the crafty
rows wait until the stealing is done
and plumber stored, then quietly in
early morn, without a cav to wake
a sleeper, rob them of their loot and
ill themselves most cOmpOrtably,
until a flock of blue-jays spring their
thrOat-rattles and make the woods
resound with cries of "Stop, thief p
For the blue-jay is an anarchistio
bird, at war with every other forest
denizen.
Red squirrels jerk their tails in
nervous pauses, or sprint on limbs,
or come head downward from watch
towers on the tall tree tops to get
what crows have left, to be scolded
in turn by the jays that have no
cOnsCiences of their own. They are
the ~cOrsairs of woods and fens, pirat
ing, marauding, thieving, hardened
and brave in all sorts of sylvan
crime, and rioters beyond COM
parisOn.
The red squirrel is the watchdog
of the trees. He, alone, is the blue
jays conqueror.
For two winters I have watched
these forest dramas from behind the
windows of my den on Mount
Gretna's side-a private box, as it
were, to Natures theatre, to which
a peck of chestnuts is the passport.
Comedy is there in the wordy duels
of the marauders, in the clustering
banks of indignant squirrels, in the
tricks of sly crows to make them
drop the nuts that stop their mouths
from sauciness or impede a sCurry
homewards; tragedy, too, in half
eaten rabbits, or blOOd-stained feath-
ers Curled about u pile of we'll cleaned
bones, or in the swOop of a hawk, a
despairing cry, and the silence that
follows death.
The party at the kitchen door is a
peaceful one. Each feathery visitor
has company maners, probably be-
cause Sufficient tor the day." is
their motto they do not hide their
food, consequently have not learned
to rob one another.
A score of slate colored Juncos
Ounce hyemaIis, usually called the
snow bird,D gathered early in the
winter as they heard the news of
BOARD and Lodging" free. Their
meal-can is the futter of the table
cloth, and they sleep in the hut of
pine boughs that shelters the winter
fuel. They are pudgy little fellows,
exact as if carved from slate and
matching it in color, excepting in
bill and belly and side-tail feathers,
which match the snow they breast
the winter through. When the snow
is deep, a pile of o T meal on top the
chOpping block is surrounded by a
busy crowd, each bird pecking with
all its might and minding strictly its
own sweet business.
Only when the tree-bOles are
coated with snow and all insect life
beyond the boring of their sharp
beaks, do sap-suckers venture to the
ground to feed. When necessity
drives them to my door, they come
cautiously, alphabetically, head
downward on the trees, tread the
earth awkwardly and zigzag after
crumbs as if the earth was a huge
tree trunk, the f~rost-raised crust its
bark, and crumbs strange insects
that do not need to be drilled from
their hiding.
Now and then a mouse darts from
under the open floor beams to get for
himself some special morsel, but the
birds pick on, unmindful of his
presence well knowing that he will
not stay to eat his luncheon with
them or eat them for his luncheon.
The entreating call of scattered
cartridges, quite different from the
lusty s'Bob- White" of their spring
song, is often echoed from the noun
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