[1] The average date of arrival was calculated from records made during the period 1884 to 1911 inclusive.
[2] This group includes species of which our records are too meager or too irregular to obtain an average as to time of arrival.
The accompanying pictures are the results of my first attempts at bird photography, and I want to let others know how much pleasure is to be derived from this method of studying birds. All the pictures I have taken so far are of the tame birds one sees every day around the house. That is, if one doesn't live in too big a city; in which case a trolley to the suburbs will answer, as it did in my case.
My equipment, which includes a second-hand camera, two plate-holders, an electrical release, a flashlight battery, small satchel, flexible wire, etc., did not cost over $8.
[Illustration: CHIPPING SPARROW FEEDING ITS YOUNG]
The first nest I saw last year was a Chickadee's nest. I found it on April 18. It was still cold, with not a leaf on the trees. The two birds were taking out chips from the top of a birch stump, which was about seven feet high. The hole was about eight inches deep. There was still no lining in the nest, so I knew that the birds had not prepared it for the reception of the eggs.
I visited it again on April 26, and expected to see two eggs in the little home; but, when I arrived there, I found that the nest had been broken off at the very bottom of the eight inches already dug. This was caused by the Chickadees' digging too close to the rotten bark, when the first gust of wind probably broke it. Much to my delight, the birds were not daunted by this misfortune, but kept on building. On April 24, the hole was started the second time. A friend saw the Chickadees begin the hole. On April 26, the hole was six inches deep! The birds had dug through fourteen inches of wood to make their home!
[Illustration: CHICKADEE LEAVING ITS NEST TO FORAGE FOR A FAMILY OF EIGHT]
On May 2 the nest was finished, and on May 9 there were eight eggs in the little bit of a hole that could hardly hold the mother bird.
May 23, I took my camera with me to the nest. I expected that the young birds would be out by that time, and that the old birds would be flying in and out with food, giving me many opportunities for photography. I looked in the nest and saw that every egg was hatched, so I proceeded to set my camera about two feet away, when who should appear on the ground-glass but one of the parents, with a mouth full of struggling little green caterpillars. She, if it were the female, looked at the camera a second or two, then, without another thought of the outside world, hopped down into the nest and fed her young.