126 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



but another classification would rather show 



Good ..... 62 

 Neutral ..... 166 

 Bad ..... 146 



374 



No doubt the " injury " does outweigh both the good and 

 the utilisation of waste material as well ; although the 

 Pigeon is in itself a good food product, if considerably less 

 valuable than the grain it consumes. But my argument is 

 not that Woodpigeons should be preserved, but that even in 

 the case of an admittedly harmful bird, statistics may be so 

 used as gravely to overstate the case against it ; and that in 

 the case of birds whose records are supposed to be bad, 

 but which do more good than is sometimes attributed to 

 them, similar methods may produce a wrong impression 

 altogether. 



Another point that must be kept in view in considering 

 whether any particular bird should be afforded, or denied, 

 protection, particularly in the breeding season, is the matter 

 of its migration habits. This is a difficult question to unravel, 

 but it is at all events clear that it is the individual bird 

 whose services or misdeeds have to be weighed, one against 

 the other, and not necessarily the dietaries of the different 

 birds, or groups of birds, composing the species. If the 

 Blackbird or Song-thrush that is with us during the breeding 

 season, destroying numberless slugs and snails and noxious 

 insects, leaves us before the autumn fruit ripens, it would be 

 a mistaken policy to destroy that bird in the supposed 

 interests of the apple or pear crop, however much injury 

 may be done to these fruits by immigrant birds of the same 

 species, bred in North-Western Europe. Dr Eagle Clarke 

 has shown {Studies in Bird Migration, Vol. I., p. 213) that 

 a general southward migration, of the British Song-thrush 

 at all events, commences as early as the beginning" of August, 

 or even in some seasons in July, and the Blackbird is seen 

 at the lighthouses by September. Probably many remain 

 till later in the year, and many individuals reside permanently 

 in their native districts, but so far as my observation goes, 



