Any Scout who has not a tree of his own to hang his box on can
probably get leave to put it up, if he asks nicely, in some
neighbour's wood or garden, or in a park, and can then visit it from
time to time to see how it is getting on.
Most nesting-boxes have their roof, or front, on hinges, or made so
that it can slide off; but it does not do to examine the nest when
once it is made, or the old birds will desert it.
* * * * *
BIRD MIGRATION.
The movements of birds as they change their quarters still puzzle the
naturalists.
It is marvellous how they seem to like travelling, and no one can
understand why they take certain paths through the air when they are
doing it.
For instance, the black pool warbler, in America, spends its summer in
Alaska, and goes down to South America for the winter. It takes the
straightest course it can from Alaska to Brazil, flying over land and
sea--and a wide sea, too, is the Gulf of Mexico. But the cliff
swallow, which also spends the winter in Brazil and the summer in
North Canada, takes quite a different route, and goes an extra 2000
miles in order to avoid going over the sea, and follows the land all
round by Panama, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, and so
through the United States.
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