Lesson Xi

The Bluebird

Leading thought—The bluebird is related to the robins and thrushes and is as beneficial as it is beautiful. We should study its habits and learn how to make nesting boxes for it, and protect it in all ways.

Methods—The observations of this lesson must be made in the field and by the pupils individually. Give to each an outline of questions to answer through seeing. There should follow reading lessons on the bluebird’s value to us and its winter migrations, and the lesson should end in discussions of best way to build boxes for its use in nesting season, its protection from cats and other enemies.

Observations—1. Which comes North earlier in spring the robin or the bluebird?

2. How do the two resemble each other and differ from each other?

3. Describe the bluebirds’ song. Do they sing all summer?

4. Describe the colors of the bluebird as follows: The head, back, breast, under parts, wings, tail. How does the male bluebird differ from his mate in colors?

5. Where were the bluebirds you saw? What were they doing? If feeding, how did they act?

6. Can you see the color of the bluebird as plainly when it is in a tree as when it is flying? If not, why?

7. Where do the bluebirds build their nests? Of what material are the nests made? Do both parents work at the nest building?

8. What is the color of the eggs? How do the young birds look, when old enough to leave the nest, as compared with their parents?

9. What do the bluebirds eat? How do they benefit us? Do they do our fruit any injury?

10. What can we do to induce the bluebirds to live near our houses? How can we protect them?

11. Where do the bluebirds spend the winter?

12. Make a colored picture of a bluebird. How can we tell the bluebird from the indigo bunting?

13. What are the bluebirds’ chief enemies?

Supplementary reading—Nestlings of Forest and Marsh, Wheelock, p. 62; True Bird Stories, Miller, p. 12; How to Attract the Birds, Blanchan; Bird Neighbors, Blanchan; Our Birds and their Nestlings, Walker, p. 17; Familiar Wild Animals, Lottridge; Audubon Leaflet, No. 24.

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.