Evening star., 1937-10-03
Woods Folk
Entertain
With Visits
Birds and Animals
In Morning Frolics
Provide Hobby.

YEAR Editor:
My hobby Is studying birds and
smaller animals.
Early every morning, when our fam
lily is eating breakfast on the side
porch, our familiar visitors, the squir-
rels, a little chipmunk. blackbirds,
robins. bluejays, sparrows, cardinals,
wild canaries. startling, chewinks, cat
birds, brown thrashers and sometimes
\ rabbit, come to see us.
When we come down in the morning,
we usually see the squirrels f1rst. They
attract our attention by running up
and down the screen. Mother always
greets them with. We'll, here are the
babies" 1--WE still call them babies as
we did when they were our household
pets)
Then the birds fly back and forth
and flap their wings when they hear us
coming, for they think they should eat
when We do. We've counted as many
as 10 bluejays and dozens OF blackbirds
at one time.
Then we throw out the bread and
my, how they eat! On the average,
all Of our visitors consume two loaves
OF bread 4 week.
In my observation, the bluejays and
cardinals take their bread. hold it down
with their feet and then peck at it.
The blackbirds take their bread and
wash 1t of in the bird bath next door
to make it softer, while the grackles
try to take all the food, but the blue
jays often prevent 1t. We have no.
ticed that the brown thrashers are the
fighters OF all the birds.
And then there is the dear little
mother thrush who built her nest in
the backyard woods, beyond the gar
den But she is always present at
mealtimes and gets her share Of the
food. Some OF the birds. especially
the bluejays and cardinals, prefer nuts
to the bread
The little chipmunk scoots around
the garden, grabs his food and disap-
pears. We put some melon out on the
lawn and the chipmunk ate the melon
seeds.
Then come the squirrels who eau
tiously take their bread and then 20
up a tree to eat in peace. One little
fellow drinks milk out of a medicine
dropper upside down on the tree.
We all agree that the squirrels are
the pigs" of all our visitors mot
meaning to hurt their feelings. of
course for they'll take nuts from us
and hide them and keep coming back
for more til we've run out OF supplies.
Then, when we went on our vaca-
ton to the Adirondacks, to visit friends.
we saw some porcupines
We were all sitting on the porch.
wondering If one really saw porcupines
1--WE had been waiting to see one for
/ four days., when our next door neigh
bors, the minister and his wife. came
over to tell us that they had visitors
;under their front porch Altogether we
scried, The porcupine!' and dashed
Sover TO their home. Sure enough there
tWas mother porcupine and her baby
eating cardboard
: We threw some pebbles at them so
they would come out and let them
selves be seen. Soon Mrs. Porky came
Eunning out for dear life. and when I
followed her, all could see was many
auills on wheels.
The baby porcupine at last came out
10 see what had become Of its mother,
and when he saw us, he hid his head
under a hole in the porch. thinking
aimself to be all the way hidden. We
roticed that the mother ran of and
left her baby to protect itself.
When we went to see them in the
morning they weren't there. EVIDENT
~, Mrs. Porcupine had not approved
Of our night visit for We didn't see
her after that
JEAN DEFANDORF aged 13).
6536 Maple Avenue.
Chevy Chase, Md.