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"Olaf says the Meadowlarks are raising their second brood now and he can find you some empty nests, if you go with him, so you can see how they are made; he will show you the Redwings' nests, too. You boys may take off your shoes and stockings; and Miss Dodo, being a girl, shall ride on Olaf's shoulder." "Please, can't I have my shoes off too?" begged Dodo. "I love to wade like the boys!"
Here the mother tends the eggs and nestlings, the father always keeping near to help her, and continually singing at his daily toil of providing for his family as charmingly as if he were still a gay bachelor; for Meadowlarks are very affectionate both toward each other and their young. It is really distressing to hear the sadness of the song of one who has lost his mate.
When the real thing happened the "calf round-up" and thirty riders in white felt hats, chaps, spurs a-jingle, and handkerchief ends flying out in the wind, lined up of a morning for orders, the blood of me went a-jump, and my nerves were all tingly with the pure joy of being alive and atop a horse as eager as hounds in the leash and with the wind of the plains in my face and the grass-land lying all around, yelling come on, and the meadowlarks singing fit to split their throats.
However, if their family relations are somewhat irregular, no one can accuse them of engaging in brawls, as so many other birds do, for both males and females seem to be on the most amicable terms with one another, and are, to all appearances, entirely free from jealousy. Who has ever seen two cowbirds fighting a duel like the orioles, meadowlarks, and robins?
Old Ben and Young Ben and Linn, the bird dogs; the dachshunds; the mongrels of the men's quarters; all the domestic fowls; the innumerable and blue-blooded hogs; the polo ponies and brood mares, the stud horses and driving horses and cow horses, colts, yearlings, the young and those enjoying a peaceful and honourable old age; Pollymckittrick; Redmond's cat and fifty others, half-wild creatures; vireos and orioles in the trees around the house; thousands and thousands of blackbirds rising in huge swarms like gnats; full-voiced meadowlarks on the fence posts; herons stalking solemnly, or waiting like so many Japanese bronzes for a chance at a gopher; red-tailed hawks circling slowly; pigeon hawks passing with their falcon dart; little gaudy sparrow hawks on top the telephone poles; buzzards, stately and wonderful in flight, repulsive when at rest; barn-owls dwelling in the haystacks, and horned owls in the hollow trees; the game in countless numbers; all the smaller animals and tiny birds in species too numerous to catalogue, all these drew their full sustenance of life from the ranch's smiling abundance.
The cowbird belongs to the family of birds scientifically known as Icteridae, which includes such familiar species as the bobolinks, orioles, meadowlarks, and the various kinds of blackbirds, none of which, I am glad to say, are parasites. The name Molothrus has been given to the genus that includes the cowbirds.
It was a perfect morning of California early summer. No breath of wind stirred over the drowsing fields, from which arose the calls of quail and the notes of meadowlarks. The air was heavy with lilac fragrance, and from the distance, as he rode between the lilac hedges, Graham heard the throaty nicker of Mountain Lad and the silvery answering whinney of the Fotherington Princess.
In a perfectly wild state they use natural material because it is the handiest and there is really no other. The phoebe uses the moss on or near the rocks where she builds; the sparrows, the bobolinks, and the meadowlarks use the dry grass of the bank or of the meadow bottom where the nest is placed.
I was poking about a marshy place in a low field one morning in early May, when, through the maze of bird-voices, laughter of robins, call of meadowlarks, song of bobolinks, ditty of sparrows, whistle of orioles, twitter of swallows, with which the air was filled, my ear suddenly caught an unfamiliar strain. I paused to listen: can it be possible, I thought, that I hear a lark, or am I dreaming?
Indeed, it is not unlikely that, if a crow did any real thinking about the matter, he might decide that robins and meadowlarks were his chickens anyway. So what the other birds would better do about it is to hide their nests as well as ever they can, and be quiet when they come and go.
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