A JUNCO VISITING AN AUDUBON FOOD-HOUSE "The Audubon food-house has been much used on this side of the water and is most satisfactory. It consists of a square hip roof, with vertical glass sides suspended beneath and open at the bottom, the whole supported on a central rustic cedar post, encircled with food trays beneath the roof. The glass sides protect the food trays from the weather and at the same time admit light and allow of easy observation. These, when placed among the - shrubbery about one's house, prove most attractive" (see pages 331 and 332). as well as to the birds, while lanes may be bordered with trees and shrubbery and walls covered with vines without any possible encroachment on the fields. An old pasture planted with savin and white pine, hawthorns, elders, barberries, cornels, viburnums, and the like, may easily be metamorphosed into a bird reservation and still be useful as a pasture. For deciduous growth to be used for cover, choose those berry-bearing trees and shrubs whose berries are most popular with the birds; and, when possible, choose also those that may offer most convenient sites for nest-building. SOME USEFUL FOOD PLANTS Care must also be taken in the choice of species, so as to get, if possible, a con tinuous supply of food, using such plants as the cherry, mulberry, raspberry, blueberry, huckleberry, etc., for the summer supply; elder and the various kinds of dogwood and viburnum, etc., for autumn; while for winter choose those plants. which hold their fruit longest, such as the hawthorn, buckthorn, mountain ash, barberry, bayberry, sumach, wild rose, and the like. Hedges, particularly if they are evergreen, are favorite resorts for birds, both in winter and summer, and an arbor-vitæ hedge is the best of them all. I remember such a hedge about one side of my father's old fashioned garden that in summer invariably held its quota of robins', song sparrows', and chipping sparrows' nests, while in winter it was the This shows a bird visitor attracted by the lump of suet fastened to the old pear tree. A lump of suet set in some convenient place is perhaps the surest way of securing bird visitors in midwinter, for it is a food supply they greatly appreciate. protected resort of such birds as stayed with us. In the Year Book of the Department of Agriculture for 1909 there is a most interesting article on "Plants Useful to Attract Birds and Protect Fruit." by W. L. McAtee. In this there is a list, on page 186, of the best trees and shrubs for attracting birds, given in the order of their attractiveness, as follows: Elders, raspberries and blackberries, mulberries, dogwood fruits, sumachs, wild cherries, blueberries, wild grapes, pokeberries, Virginia creeper berries, bayberries, juniper berries, service berries, holly berries, strawberries, the fruits of viburnums, hackberries, huckleberries, haws, spicebush berries, rose hips, sarsaparilla, sour gum, gooseberries, currants, and snowberry. To the above list is added the following supplementary list of some other plants known to be attractive to birds, and to this the names of other species doubtless might be added: Manzanita, barberry, buffalo berry, silverberry, buckthorn, mountain ash, China berry, California Christmas berry, pepper tree, magnolia, nockaway, lote bush, and bluewood. With the above very comprehensive lists to choose from, it is not a difficult matter to make out a list of trees and shrubs for almost any place, no matter how small, that will supply its quota of birds' food from early summer to the following spring, while if the place is a large one, or the problem at all difficult, it may be the best policy, as well as in the end the most economical, to consult some competent landscape architect as to the proper disposition of the proposed plantations. What is worth doing at all is always worth doing well. Besides the trees and shrubs in the above lists, there are many herbaceous plants whose seeds are attractive to birds "In bad weather, however, particularly in the North, where we are so apt to be covered up with snow, more artificial means of feeding should be resorted to, and food stations, food-houses, and food shelters of various sorts should be established in proper places. If quail or grouse are to be fed, inconspicuous bough shelters may be built in protected places among the fields or woods most frequented by them" (see page 331). PINE SISKINS AND RED POLLS FEEDING ABOUT A HOUSE: NEW HAMPSHIRE The pine siskin is a lover of evergreens and spends the winter wandering from copse to copse in search of seeds and pine cones. The red poll is a winter visitor from the far North, and with its rich crimson head and breast makes a pretty picture in the snow. Photo by Ernest Harold Baynes A SHY HAIRY WOODPECKER AT DINNER The hairy woodpecker is a somewhat shy bird, who prefers the forest to the orchard and is not often seen about the house. His note is louder and sharper than that of most woodpeckers and cannot by any called musical. The chickadee is found in all parts of the East, from Labrador to "Baron von Berlepsch has invented a food bell that supplies grain, etc., automatically from a receptacle above, and which may be suspended from a tree or piazza roof or any other place that seems best" (see page 332). Sunflowers may be planted in groups about the flower garden or in lines among the rows of vegetables; wild sarsaparilla and pokeberry along the boundary walls; while if you have a corner somewhere in the fields that can be planted with buckwheat and Japanese millet, it will prove a great attraction, particularly in winter. FOOD-HOUSES AND SHELTERS In bad weather, however, particularly in the North, where we are so apt to be covered up with snow, more artificial means of feeding should be resorted to, and food stations, food-houses, and food shelters of various sorts should be established in proper places. If quail or grouse are to be fed, inconspicuous bough shelters may be built in protected places among the fields or woods most frequented by them, while about the house or among the neighboring plantations all sorts of devices may be resorted to. Baron von Berlepsch, in Germany, has invented a food-house, an adaptation of which, called the Audubon food-house, has been much used on this side of the water, and is most satisfactory (see page 327). It consists of a square hip roof, with vertical glass sides suspended beneath and open at the bottom, the whole supported on a central rustic cedar post, encircled with food trays beneath the roof. The glass sides protect the food |