How hard they worked to support their
families, especially the red-headed and speckledy woodpeckers and
flickers; digging, hammering on scaly bark and decaying trunks and
branches from dawn to dark, coming and going at intervals of a few
minutes all the livelong day!
We discovered a hen-hawk's nest on the top of a tall oak thirty or
forty rods from the shanty and approached it cautiously. One of the
pair always kept watch, soaring in wide circles high above the tree,
and when we attempted to climb it, the big dangerous-looking bird came
swooping down at us and drove us away.
We greatly admired the plucky kingbird. In Scotland our great ambition
was to be good fighters, and we admired this quality in the handsome
little chattering flycatcher that whips all the other birds. He was
particularly angry when plundering jays and hawks came near his home,
and took pains to thrash them not only away from the nest-tree but
out of the neighborhood. The nest was usually built on a bur oak near
a meadow where insects were abundant, and where no undesirable visitor
could approach without being discovered.
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