23 September 2005

Friday bird blog

Short-billed marsh wren

Illustration by Allan Brooks

from The Chicago Daily Tribune
August 11, 1954

Wren Nests on Bus
A London wren nested beneath the running board of a bus that made daily trips to Swanley, Kent. In South Africa a mountain chat constructed its home and raised a family beneath a railroad coach that racketed back and forth daily on a 62 mile run.

Man also provides birds with nesting materials. A pigeon in New York City fashioned an ultramodern nest entirely of paper clips. Two crows in India had the same idea, but used spectacle frames stolen from an occulist. Bald eagles especially like curios and have embellished their nests with electric light bulbs, bottles, shoes, corn cobs and tattered magazines.

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