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AMERICAN FORESTRY 



I 





■ ^^-W). '' 



A YouM, Chickadee at Home, Near Mekiuan, N. H. 



Photo by Ernest Harold Baynes. 



needless to inquire further into a ques- 

 tion the answer to which is so patent. 



The second question — that relating 

 to the economic value of birds — is a 

 more complex one, and the answer to 

 it is not so universal in its application. 

 The investigations of the U. S. Biolog- 

 ical Survey, however, indicate strongly 

 that birds as a whole are of the greatest 

 value to the general agricultural inter- 

 ests of the country. An insignificant 

 minority of birds — as for instance the 

 sharp shinned and Cooper's hawks, 

 which prey largely upon useful birds, 

 and certain birds which do extensive 

 damage to farm crops — has been con- 

 demned, but the great majority of 

 species have been found, through care- 



ful investigation of the contents of their 

 stomachs, to be decidedly beneficial. 

 Although the relation of birds to for- 

 ests has not been studied quite so care- 

 fully in this country as their relation to 

 purely agricultural crops, yet consider- 

 able data have been compiled on this sub- 

 ject, and these indicate that birds in the 

 forests are fully as useful as, and per- 

 haps less harmful than, they are in the 

 cultivated fields. 



Among the conspicuously useful forest 

 birds in Massachusetts is the familiar 

 chickadee, considerably over one half of 

 whose food consists of moths, cater- 

 pillars and other harmful insects and 

 their eggs, including both tent cater- 

 pillars, canker worms, codling moths, 



