Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 1 (1843).djvu/242

214 there the first thing in the morning, and apparently the last thing before going to roost. Seeing that the nuts were carried away whole, I began to crack them, and fix the kernel only in the crevices, or by means of pins, to the tree. The greater part of the nuts were now eaten on the spot; occasionally, when a large piece was got, the birds flew away with it to some tall trees close by, but very soon returned for more. Their absence on these occasions was very short, certainly not long enough to lead me to suppose they had time to eat the nut; I concluded it was either added to a store already existing, or deposited on the tall trees.

The nuts latterly were fixed to a sort of table of about eight inches diameter, formed by the loss of a limb of the tree which had been cut off. They were put on to the number of seven or eight at a time; but on no one occasion (and I watched them almost daily for two years) did I see the pair feeding at the same time. They were frequently—perhaps generally—both on the tree at the same time, but the female never ventured to help herself in the presence of the male; and if he returned while she was in the act of feeding, she immediately retired, leaving the banquet to his solitary enjoyment. If by chance she had not observed his return to the tree, he very unceremoniously drove her away: however, on two occasions in the breeding season, I have seen him feed her with much apparent tenderness. Sometimes in May they absented themselves altogether, and I saw nothing of them for a month: one date of such absence was May 9. Neither of them w r ould permit the presence of another bird, and the accidental arrival of a titmouse or sparrow, was the signal for a very amusing chace from bough to bough and shrub to shrub; the intruder appearing to have a most wholesome fear of the nuthatch's formidable bill. Even the pugnaceous robin holds them in awe, and retires without contest.

I may here observe that the ox-eye (Parus major), the nun (P. cæruleus), and (rarely) the cole-titmouse (P. ater), were as fond of the nuts as the nuthatch, and worked at them with much assiduity during his absence; yet though there were three or more tits feeding at once, they did not cause much loss to the proper guests, as the pieces they abstracted were very minute; on the contrary, two or three blows of the nuthatch's bill frequently divided the nut into halves, one of which was carried off on the instant, and the other also, if both birds were on the tree.

Fragments of nut were sometimes driven from four to six feet from the tree by the violence of the blows applied: they were almost invariably caught by the bird before they reached the ground, and, with-