The Birds 



sters are filling the world with joy and gladness. The insect 

 eaters, the most important of all groups, make the existence 

 of plant and animal life on earth possible and, without their 

 aid, no life can long exist. Each plant and animal has an 

 enemy and some of them have many. The parasites and 

 saprophytes are those that live on the work of others. The 

 statement that "Every louse has a louse" is partly literal 

 truth. But besides the parasites and saprophytes, enemies of 

 all life, there are hundreds of thousands of other forms that 

 are depending on the same foods that man depends on for 

 his existence. These insects produce their offspring by the 

 millions at each hatching, whereas the mammals produce 

 only a few. Many insects develop into adult form within a 

 few hours or days at least, whereas, most mammals require 

 months or years to develop into an adult stage. There must 

 be a means of keeping all life in balance and the birds fur- 

 nish this balance above all other creatures. 



Chester A. Reed, an eminent authority on birds, in his 

 "Bird Guide," says: "The daily consumption of noxious 

 insects in Massachusetts is twenty-one thousand bushels. The 

 estimate is good for about five months in the year. May to 

 September, inclusive : during the remainder of the year the 

 insects, eggs, and larvae destroyed by our winter, late fall and 

 early spring migrants will be equivalent to nearly half this 

 quantity." It must be remembered that Massachusetts is a 

 small State but multiply this by forty-eight for all the states, 

 multiply the millions of insects contained in a daily ration 

 and then multiply this number by the potential reproductive 

 capacity of each insect and egg destroyed and we have astro- 

 nomical figures which portray the possibility and probability 



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