With nature and a camera

Chapter V. Nests, eggs, and young

Birds' nests *

MANY people imagine that birds build their nests exactly alike, according to an undeviating pattern rigidly fixed for the instinctive guidance of each species; but such is certainly not the case, although it is truly wonderful how closely the different members of a species adhere to a general type of architecture.

The fact is, I believe, that birds, like human beings, possess individually varying degrees of intelligence, skill, and energy, and that differences in any of these qualities are to the close observer plainly marked in the constructive character of their work. Chaffinches, as a rule, build exceedingly neat, cup-shaped nests, as everybody knows, but not infrequently quite a slovenly structure, for the species, may be met with. Sometimes they are composed of green moss and lined with horse-hair only, at others the outside is liberally studded with bits of lichen and curtained with cobwebs, and the inside lined with horse-hair, cow-hair, rabbits' down, and feathers. It is said that bits of lichen are used on the outer walls of the nest to give it a general resemblance to the bark of the branches surrounding it, and although I must admit that in many cases the idea of harmonisation appears to underlie the ornamentation, it is certainly not always the case, as some years ago I met with one the builder of which had thickly studded its outer walls with bits of an old newspaper, in such a situation that the journalistic decorations really increased rather than lessened its chances of discovery.

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That individuals of a certain species begin to nest almost simultaneously in a given district I proved last spring, by finding thirteen Chaffinches' nests in various stages of construction on the 24th and 25th of April. On the other hand, some early pairs of Starlings had young ones hatched out before the last few dozen members of their winter flocks had fairly broken up.

Odd as it may seem at first sight, birds occasionally lose their lives by remarkable accidents which happen to them whilst engaged in the building of their nests. During a ramble one evening last spring, I came upon a female Chaffinch suspended by a strong horse-hair within two or three feet of her almost completed nest. A hard baked worm-casting had cemented itself to one end of the hair, which had in consequence become twisted round a twig, and the opposite end so entangled about the unfortunate bird's neck as to form a running noose, and strangle it by its own efforts to escape. It was a most pathetic picture, and as my brother made a photograph of it, the poor bird's mate kept on calling for her and flying round in the most evident distress.

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Hen chaffinch hanged by a hair

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A Common Wren will build the outside of its nest of old hay straws when placing it in the side of a rick - as shown in our illustration below, which my brother was lucky enough to secure just as the owner was about to enter - of green moss when situated in a mossy bank, and of dead leaves when in a hedgerow, bramble bush, or amongst a few slender twigs sprouting from the trunk of a tree where a branch has been lopped off. I have met with several in the last two positions in woods, and I must admit that they very nearly escaped minute examination on account of their close resemblance to an accidental collection of leaves. These facts would, on the face of them, appear to prove that the bird in each case deliberately chose the materials for the outer walls of its nest in order that they should harmonise with their surroundings and materially lessen the chances of detection - an end which is undoubtedly attained, but whether by accident or design it is difficult to say. I am inclined to think the former, because I believe that birds, as a rule, build their nests with such suitable materials as lie handiest, although I remember an instance of a Wren flying over a quarter of a mile for the feathers with which she lined her little house. I was able to prove this, because those used were all off a particularly light-coloured hen Grouse, the skeleton and remaining feathers of which I shortly afterwards found.

Wrens build what are popularly known as "cock's nests," which are in every way equal to those in which eggs are laid and young ones reared, except for the fact that they do not contain a lining of feathers. These nests, I should say from my own experience, number quite three to one of those made for breeding purposes. Some ornithologists are of opinion that they are made to sleep in, but although I have met with members of the Tit family comfortably tucked away in them at night-time, I have never come across one occupied by a member of the species which built it.

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Wren going into her nest in rick

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Water-hens generally build two or three spare nests, of slighter construction than the one they actually occupy, round a pond, and Plovers often scratch out and prepare little hollows in which they never lay their eggs.

Some Sand Martins lay their eggs upon quite an elaborate bed of straws and feathers, whilst others in the same bank deposit theirs upon the scantiest lining of straws only. Individual nests belonging to birds of the same species vary considerably in point of size without any reference whatever to the character of the situation occupied, as the most casual glance at a number of House Martins' nests will prove.

In regard to hiding their nests, individual birds differ greatly. Last spring my brother and I found a Blackbird's in a hedge merely by the fact that the bird in building it had carelessly heft a conspicuous trail of the materials she had used from the outside of the bush right up to the very nest. A schoolboy would have detected it through this slovenly piece of workmanship quite thirty yards away, as was doubtless the case, for the eggs did not remain long in it. On the other hand, within a hundred yards of it, I found the most, cunningly-hidden Blackbird's nest that I have ever seen. I was looking round a friend's garden, when I came upon an old black horse's tail which had been thrown into a yew tree and lodged near the trunk, and about five feet from the ground. The thing looked curious, and, with an idea of examining it more closely, I seized the lower end and gave it a tug. To my surprise, a hen Blackbird fluttered out in great alarm, and I discovered that she had a nest and eggs on a branch close to the bole of the tree and quite behind the horse's tail, which, whilst forming a kind of curtain (it was somewhat spread out) through which she could see, hid her and her nest most effectually from view.