HODGE I 



X. 1 TV RES TUD Y A XD THE BOB WHITE 



By this method Mrs. Nice has added 61 weed seeds to the 

 68 species which the Department of Agriculture had previously 



discovered by stomach 

 examination. Among 



the additions are such 

 pests as "pusly", Canada 

 and bull thistle, dodder, 

 fireweetd, wild carrot, 

 ironweed, plantain, mul- 

 lein, ox-eye and yellow 

 daisy, burdock, a n d 

 witch grass. 



The bobwhite has 

 been discovered to eat 

 135 different kinds of 

 insects, many of them 

 the most injurious that 

 we have; the potato 

 beetle — which few other 

 birds eat — cucumber 

 beetle, cut worms, army 

 w o r m, wire worms, 

 chinch bugs, cotton boll 

 worm, and cotton boll 

 weevil. Mrs. Nice's ob- 

 servations have added a 

 few specially significant 



species to the 



govern- 



HU MS 



merit lists, among them mosquitoes, typhoid and stable flies, 

 (larvae, pupae and adults), squash bugs, plant lice of many 

 species, moths, cabbage butterfly, peach-tree borer, codling 

 moth, carpet-beetle, clothes moths, and the Hessian flv. 



These studies, which constitute the most careful and com- 

 plete investigation ever made of the food of any bird, have en- 

 abled Mrs. Nice to estimate that a bobwhite hen will eat an 

 average of 75.000 insects and 5,000,000 weed seeds in a year — 

 about y l / 2 pounds of insects and 10 pounds of weed seed. The pa- 

 per, soon to be published in full, will constitute the most com- 

 plete evidence that the bird, until the country is well stocked, 

 is worth one hundred fold more alive and at work than dead. 

 Three years ago, I was told of a farmer who was asked by some 



