FROSTY MORNINGS

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 35, 10 August 1934, Page 8

FROSTY MORNINGS

A WORD FOR THE BIRDS

(fiy Johannes C. Andersen.) '' Through the bare hawthorn Blows the cold wind."

On awakening these days in the very early morning one wonders at the silence. There is no chattering of the sparrows in the eaves. There have been warm half-promißes, but they have had cold fulfilment; the last nips of winter are still to come. True, one can tell-by "the cheerful sweet daphne in the buttonhole that the sap is rising, the blood mounting; one can tell that, too, by the yellow'narcissi,- the freesi.as, and now tho trumpet daffodils that lighten the drab of Lanibton Quay, by the kowhai already sprinkled with yellow in tho Botanical Gardens. The thrushes shout it out, too; the dunnock warbles it; the chaffinch is beginning his crested wittaweeoos. All the same, the sparrows go to roost without their chatter, and without their chatter awake in the frosty mornings.' One misses their noisy cheerfulness. They are suffering their annual depression. This is their hardest month, when the weaklings, the unfit, are rigorously weeded out—no hospitals, no nursing—and, even the fittest ha-ve a hard time. This is true of all tho birds; not only of the sparrow. That'shrewd observer, Darwin, one year paid particular attention, and found that around his home 80 per cent, of the small birds were killed oft' in the winter. That, or even a higher percentage, has always been the yearly death-rate of the small birds. . ' ■".:.. .. ■:-,'"'

Caterpillars are in the metamorphic stago, in hiding with tho insects under the bark, in the ground well out of sight, and the birds havo hard work to do to find any insect food at all; we ourselves know how the flios havo gone to sleep, and the spiders as if to keep them company. Watch any of the berrybearing nativo shrubs —kerainu, houhou (fivefingor), taupata. In tho autumn these had plenty of orange or black berries; see how they are stripped now. There are some hollies Close to my homo; early in the winter they were red with berries; now they are nearly bare, and there are still weeks to go before the new crop of insects or, berries will bo ready. The seeds of weeds, too, are being gleaned; thistle and plantain have! gone. What else is there for tho birds to- gather? , Some aro so lucky as to hear tho chirping greeting of the sparrows morning and evening still; all the chattering is not silenced; but thoso who hear it aro the ones who, with forethought, put out a few scraps overnight, or in the late afternoon, remembering their noisy but cheerful friends; thoso are the kindhearts of the community.

"Well, this is the time to give the birds a hand; later on those that aro able to soe tho hard days through- will increase in numbers as tho insect pests awake and increase; tho birds and the insects diminish and increase together. Givo the birds a bettor start fortßo spring by feeding them in tho winter,' and you will havo less insect pests to plague your gardens and fields.

Sco how a handful of straps will bring a score or more in an eager flock; sparrows which everybody knows; chaffinches with their white-barred wings; goldfinches, with their flashes of bright yellow; shy little grey dunnocks, green silvercyes, even speckled thrushes, and cautious yellow-billed blackbirds. You will not suffer for your giving, but the birds will benefit by your kindness. Then later, when the garden is in trim and everything sprouting, tho grateful birds will keep your garden clear of slugs, and earwigs, a.nd grubs, and other creeping disagreeable things; yes1, and will reward you by pulling up your unprotected peas, and nipping off your superfluous primrose buds. I'promise you; and you know their tricks and their manners.