File:Birds and their nests and eggs - found in and near great towns (1907) (14755536785).jpg

Identifier: birdstheirnestse00vosg (find matches)
Title: Birds and their nests and eggs : found in and near great towns
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Vos, George Herklots
Subjects: Birds Birds Birds
Publisher: London : G. Routledge New York : E.P. Dutton.
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
ed for this methodof feeding by its hooked strong beak, and awell-formed, muscular body. It is not avery uncommon bird, and may often be seennear London. It frequents places whereit can get its prey easiest, so it chooses openwoods and commons. It watches for itsvictims perched on some convenient bough.It devours them at once or stores themup in its larder. This cannibal plucksbirds before eating them, and any indigest-ible portions are thrown up as pellets (likethe owl and kingfisher). The length of thebutcher bird is about five and a half inches;the upper parts are brown, the under partswhite, the sides red. The hen has not got thegrey patch on the back. It is migratory,leaving us in September or October. And now the failing light warned us thatwe had to be getting homewards. As thetrain sped on, the sun setting orange-red ina cloudless sky of purple-gold (thus tinted IN THE NORTH OF KENT 11 j and its light subdued by the thick air of theMetropohs, so that we could easily look at it
Text Appearing After Image:
XIX : Red-backed Shrike or Butcher-bird (§ size). without blinking) seemed, hanging there,to be racing us, as houses and trees were B.N.—HI. I 114 A LONG DAY WITH THE BIkDS passed in rapid succession, but always gainingin the race. A large balloon floated almostmotionless over the Thames. The rooks andstarlings that had been feeding on the flatsduring the day had left. Only sparrows wereto be seen, communities of them, chirpingnoisily as is their manner in the evening whenthey go to their roosting nooks. How thank-ful, I thought, we ought to be that thesehomely little birds grace our roofs and chim-neys. What would they be without them !Some high chalk cuttings stood out clearlyin the evening light, and down on the river-side the clean, newly-born lambs snugginground their dams quietly browsing the shortgrass were plainly visible, whilst their smoke-begrimed mothers were almost lost to viewin the twilight. Some fleecy clouds overheadhad gathered into the shape known as themackerel

Note About Images