Birds and Nature Vol. 9 No. 3 [March 1901]

A few words as to the general coloring of the parrot group. Tropical forestine birds have usually a ground tone of green because that color enables them best to escape notice among the monotonous verdure of equatorial woodland scenery. In the north, it is true, green is a very conspicuous color; but that is only because for half the year our trees are bare, and even during the other half they lack that “breadth of tropic shade” which characterizes the forests of all hot countries. Therefore, in temperate climates, the common ground-tone of birds is brown, to harmonize with the bare boughs and leafless twigs, the dead grass or stubble. But in the ever-green tropics, green is the proper hue for concealment or defense. Therefore the parrots, the most purely tropical family of birds on earth, are chiefly greenish; and among the smaller and more defenceless sorts, like the little love-birds, where the need for protection is greatest, the green of the plumage is almost unbroken. Green, in truth, must be regarded as the basal parrot tint, from which all other colors are special decorative variations.

But fruit-eating and flower-feeding creatures – such as butterflies and humming birds – seeking their food among the brilliant flowers and bright berries, almost invariably acquire a taste for varied coloring, and by the aid of the factor in evolution, known as sexual selection, this taste stereotypes itself at last upon their wings and plumage. They choose their mates for their attractive coloring. As a consequence, all the larger and more gregarious parrots, in which the need for concealment is less, tend to diversify the fundamental green of their coats with red, yellow or blue, which in some cases takes possession of the entire body. The largest kinds of all, like the great blue and yellow or crimson macaws, are as gorgeous as birds well could be; they are also the species least afraid of enemies. In Brazil, it is said, they may often be seen moving about in pairs in the evening with as little attempt at concealment as storks in Germany.

Even the New Zealand owl-parrot still retains many traces of his original greenness, mixed with the brown and dingy yellow of his nocturnal and burrowing nature.

I now turn to the parrot’s power of mimicry in human language. This power is only an incidental result of the general intelligence of parrots, combined with the other peculiarities of their social life and forestine character. Dominant woodland animals, like monkeys and parrots, at least if vegetarian in their habits, are almost always gregarious, noisy, mischievous, and imitative. And the imitation results directly from a somewhat high order of intelligence. The power of intellect, in all except the very highest phases, is merely the ability to accurately imitate another. Monkeys imitate action to a great extent, but their voices are hardly flexible enough for very much mimicry of the human voice. Parrots and some other birds, on the contrary, like the mocking bird, being endowed with considerable flexibility of voice, imitate either songs or spoken words with great distinctness. In the parrot the power of attention is also very considerable, for the bird will often repeat to itself the lesson it has decided to learn. But most of us forget that at best the parrot knows only the general application of a sentence, not the separate meanings of its component words. It knows, for example, that “Polly wants a lump of sugar” is a phrase often followed by a gift of food. But to believe it can understand an exclamation like “What a homely lot of parrots!” is to credit the bird with genuine comprehension. A careful consideration of the evidence has convinced almost all scientific men that, at the most, a parrot knows the meaning of a sentence in the same way as a dog understands the meaning of “Rats” or a horse knows the significance of “Get up.”

Lawrence Irwell.

 
How can our fancies help but go
Out from this realm of mist and rain,
Out from this realm of sleet and snow,
When the first Southern violets blow?
 

– Thomas Bailey Aldrich, “Spring in New England.”

POLLY

Letty was out under the big elm tree watching the kitten playing with the autumn leaves that were on the ground.

Suddenly something struck Letty on the shoulder. She looked around quickly, thinking that somebody had thrown a stone at her. No one was in sight, though she looked all about and even up in the tree. Then she noticed that the kitten was rolling something with its paws. She stooped and picked up what looked like a little bunch of elm leaves. She thought it strange that they should be stuck together, and when she found that it was quite heavy she was still more surprised.

She carried it into the house to show to her mother. “What is it?” she asked. “It came down off the tree and hit me on my shoulder. Is there a stone inside of it?”

“No,” said her mother. “It is a chrysalis. Some worm that lived on the elm tree drew these leaves together and spun a little case inside, and when the leaves were ready to fall, the chrysalis came down with them.”

“What kind of a worm do you suppose it was?”

“I do not know, but it must have been a large one, or the chrysalis would not be so heavy. We will keep it, and in the spring when the worm has turned into a butterfly and comes out of the case, perhaps we can learn what its name is.”

“But how will it get out?” asked Letty, anxiously. “It is so hard and tough. I tried to pull off one of the leaves and it stuck on tight.”

“Yes,” said her mother, “it is very tough and you could not tear it open with your fingers even if you tried very hard. But the butterfly throws out some kind of fluid which softens the silk – for it is a kind of silk, you know – and makes a hole large enough to crawl through. It does not have to be very big, as the butterfly’s wings are soft and wet. It has to let them dry and grow strong and stiff before it can fly.”

The chrysalis was put in a safe place and Letty forgot all about it for many months, which was not strange when there were so many things for her to do all through the winter and early spring.

But her mother did not forget, and one day in June she called Letty in from her play telling her that she had something to show her.

“Do you remember the elm chrysalis?” she asked, and she put it in Letty’s hand.

“Why how light it is!” she cried. “The butterfly has come out, oh! where is it?”

Her mother led the way to the plant stand. “See, on that begonia,” she said.

“Oh, oh!” cried Letty, “what a beautiful butterfly!”

It was very large, nearly five inches across when its wings were spread. It was dull yellow, with darker shadings, a little red in waving lines, and a gray stripe along the front edge of its outer wings. It was quite furry, especially the large yellow body. Each of the four wings had a transparent eye spot, and the under wings had a good deal of black about these little round windows, as Letty called them.

“And, mamma, see! It has beautiful little dark-blue eyes.”

“Yes, it has, but I did not notice them before.”

“Well, what kind of a butterfly is it?”

“It is not a butterfly at all.”

“Not a butterfly?” said Letty, surprised.

“No; it is a moth. Have you noticed its antennae – the horns on the front of its head?”

“They look like feathers,” said Letty; “no, like ferns.”

“So they do,” said her mother. “Well, that is how we know it is not a butterfly, for they have thread-like antennae, with a little knob on the end. Moths fly by night and that is probably why this one stays so still now.”

“I wish I knew its name,” said Letty.

“If you will take my card and run over to the public library and ask the librarian to give you a book that tells about moths and butterflies, we will find out.”

Letty came back in a little while with the book and her mother began to look in it.

“Oh!” she said pretty soon, “it has such a long name that I don’t believe you can remember it. It is Telea polyphemus.”

“I’ll call it Polly for short,” said Letty.

When they had learned all they could about the moth Letty asked what they should do with it.

“This book says they do no very great harm,” said her mother, “and it is so beautiful that I think we will let it have its liberty.”

So the Telea polyphemus was carried out and placed on a tree trunk where it stayed all the rest of the day. But the next morning when Letty went to look for it, it was gone.

Susan Brown Robbins.

 
Hark! ’tis the bluebird’s venturous strain
High on the old fringed elm at the gate —
Sweet-voiced, valiant on the swaying bough,
Alert, elate,
Dodging the fitful spits of snow,
New England’s poet-laureate
Telling us Spring has come again!
 

– Thomas Bailey Aldrich, “Spring in New England.”

THE AMERICAN WHITE PELICAN
(Pelecanus erythrorhynchos.)

In the year 1758 the naturalist Linnaeus gave to the birds called Pelicans the generic name Pelecanus. In this genus he also placed the cormorants and the gannets. These with the snake-birds, the frigate-birds and the tropic-birds were for a long time grouped together under the family name Pelecanidae. This name, however, is now restricted to the various species of the Pelicans which are included in a single genus.

The generic name Pelecanus and the common name Pelican are derived from pelekan, the Greek name for these birds. They were well known to the ancients by whom they were called Ornacrotalus. There is a legend of great antiquity for which there is no foundation in fact, which states that the pelican feeds to her young blood drawn from her own breast, in which she herself has made the incision.

There are about ten species of pelicans distributed throughout the world, mostly confined to those countries having warm climates. Two or three species, however, extend their range into the colder regions during the summer months. Three of the species inhabit North America and two of these are seldom seen except on the sea coasts; the brown pelican (Pelecanus fuscus) on the Atlantic coast and the California brown pelican (Pelecanus californicus) on the Pacific coast. The other species is the bird of our illustration, and is common in the interior as well as on the seaboard of California.

The pelicans are notably social in their habits, a large number nesting together. The flight of a large flock is an attractive sight. Their wings move in unison and apparently without much effort. After a few strokes of the wings they frequently sail, forming graceful circles, often at great elevations.

The most remarkable characteristic of these birds, however, is the large pouch formed by an elastic skin depending from the two sides of the lower mandible and extending nearly the whole length of the bill. This pouch may be greatly distended and will hold a large quantity of either solid or liquid matter. The bills are depressed and strongly hooked.

The American White Pelican ranges throughout the whole of North America as far north, in the interior, as the 61° north latitude, and as far to the southward in winter as Central America. Northward from Florida, along the Atlantic coast, it is now rare.

In the year 1838 Audubon gave this species the specific name Americanus, in view of his discovery that it differed in essential characteristics from the European form, called Ornacrotalus. The most marked difference that he noticed was the crest upon the upper mandible which he supposed was permanent and not, as we now know, a characteristic of this species only during the breeding season. In writing of the naming of this species he uses the following beautiful language: “In consequence of this discovery, I have honored it with the name of my beloved country, over the mighty streams of which may this splendid bird wander free and unmolested to the most distant times, as it has already done in the misty ages of unknown antiquity.”

Much as we desire to honor Audubon, who has given us so much of interest concerning the life histories of the birds, yet we are restrained by the rules of scientific naming, which require under ordinary circumstances, the use of the earliest name. Audubon’s name was antedated by that of Gmelin, a German Naturalist, who in 1788 noticing the peculiar characteristics of the American White Pelican and that it differed from the European form, gave it the name erythrorhynchos, which is now used by ornithologists. This name has its origin in two Greek words, meaning red and bill.

The peculiar growth or crest on the bill which disappears soon after the breeding season, varies greatly both in size and shape. Dr. Ridgway says: “Frequently it consists of a single piece, nearly as high as long, its vertical outlines almost parallel, and the upper outline quite regularly convex, the largest specimen seen being about three inches high, by as many in length. More frequently, however, it is very irregular in shape, usually less elevated, and not infrequently with ragged anterior, or even posterior continuations.” At this time the bill is also more or less orange-red in color.

An excellent narrative of the habits of the White Pelican is given in the Ornithology of Illinois, where Dr. Ridgway quotes the words of Col. N. S. Goss regarding those who “have not seen the White Pelicans upon their feeding grounds, but may have read Audubon’s interesting description of the manner in which the birds unite and drive the fishes into shallow water, where they can catch them, which they cannot well do in deep water, as their skins are honey-combed with air cells that buoy them up like cork, and prevent their diving, and they do not plunge for their food when upon the wing, like their cousins, the Brown Pelicans, and therefore have to adopt fishing habits suited to shallow waters. I have often noticed the birds in flocks, in pairs, or alone, swimming on the water with partially opened wings, and head drawn down and back, the bill just clearing the water, ready to strike and gobble up the prey within their reach; when so fishing, if they ran into a shoal of minnows, they would stretch out their necks, drop their heads upon the water, and with open mouths and extended pouches, scoop up the tiny fry. Their favorite time for fishing on the seashore is during the incoming tide, as with it come the small fishes to feed upon the insects caught in the rise, and upon the low form of life in the drift, as it washes shoreward, the larger fishes following in their wake, each, from the smallest to the largest, eagerly engaged in taking life in order to sustain life. All sea-birds know this, and the time of its coming well. The White Pelicans, that have been patiently waiting in line along the beach, quietly move into the water and glide smoothly out so as not to frighten the life beneath. At a suitable distance from the shore they form into line in accordance with the sinuosities of the beach, each facing shoreward and awaiting their leader’s signal to start. When this is given, all is commotion; the birds, rapidly striking the water with their wings, throwing it high above them and plunging their heads in and out, fairly make the water foam as they move in an almost unbroken line, filling their pouches as they go. When satisfied with their catch, they wade and waddle into line again upon the beach, where they remain to rest, standing or sitting as suits them best, until they have leisurely swallowed the fishes in their nets; then, if undisturbed, they generally rise in a flock and circle for a long time high in air.”

The White Pelicans will consume a large amount of food; in fact, they are gluttonous. It is said that the remains of several hundred minnows have been taken from the stomach of a single pelican. Usually they are the most active in the pursuit of their prey for a short time after sunrise and also before sunset.

The chief breeding grounds of the White Pelican are from Minnesota northwards to the limit of its range. It nests also in isolated and greatly separated localities to the westward. It is said that several thousand permanently breed on the islands of the great Salt Lake. There are reasons for believing that it also breeds in Florida and westward along the Gulf of Mexico as far as Texas.

The White Pelican builds its nest on the ground using small sticks and twigs. They usually select a clump of sage or some other plant that will afford the nest some protection. Frequently sand is heaped around the nest to the depth of about six inches. The nests are about one foot in diameter. The color of the two to four eggs is a chalky white and the surface is quite rough, due to the irregular thickness of the outer coating. The average size of the eggs is about three and one-half by two and one-third inches.

The White Pelican as it calmly floats on the surface of the water, some distance from the shore, has been mistaken for the sail of a boat as the moist white feathers glisten in the sunshine.

Longfellow has beautifully woven this fact into the “Song of Hiawatha.”

 
“O’er the water floating, flying,
Something in the hazy distance,
Something in the mists of morning,
Loomed and lifted from the water,
Now seemed floating, now seemed flying,
Coming nearer, nearer, nearer.
Was it Shingebis the diver?
Or the pelican, the Shada?
Or the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah?
Or the white-goose, Waw-be-wawa,
With the water dripping, flashing
From its glossy neck and feathers?
It was neither goose nor diver,
Neither pelican nor heron
O’er the water floating, flying,
Through the shining mist of morning,
But a birch canoe with paddles,
Rising, sinking on the water.”
 

Seth Mindwell.