3l8 CONNECTICUT GEOL. AND NAT. HIST. SURVEY. [Bull. 



" The relation of the bird to man was investigated by the 

 Department of Agriculture, and the results were published in 

 1889. This investigation, which included extended field observa- 

 tion and the examination of more than 600 stomachs, showed 

 the species to be a serious pest. Since the appearance of this 

 publication 132 additional stomachs have been examined, and a 

 special study has been made of the food of the young. For the 

 latter purposes 50 birds from 3 days to 3 weeks old were collected 

 during the last of June and the first of July, 1899, ^ rom a farming 

 region in Virginia opposite Washington, D. C. 



" The 82 stomachs of adults were collected throughout the 

 year in rural localities in Maryland, Michigan, New York, Penn- 

 sylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Kansas. Animal matter, practically 

 all insects, constitutes 2 per cent of the food, and vegetable mat- 

 ter, almost entirely seeds, 98 per cent. Insects were taken chiefly 

 during May and June, when they composed 10 and 8 per cent 

 respectively of the month's food. Of the 98 per cent constituting 

 the vegetable food, 7 per cent consisted of grass seed, largely of 

 plants of the genera Zizania (wild rice), Panicum, and Cluctoch- 

 loa, and notably crab-grass and pigeon-grass, and 17 per cent of 

 various weeds not belonging to the grass family. The grass 

 and weed seeds taken are not noticeably different from those 

 usually eaten by native sparrows. But what especially differen- 

 tiates the vegetable food from that of all other sparrows is the 

 large proportion of grain consumed, which formed 74 per cent 

 of the entire food of the year and 90 per cent of that of the period 

 from June to August. 



" The examination of the contents of the stomachs of the 50 

 nestlings made an unfavorable showing for the species. It was 

 found that, instead of being exclusively insectivorous, like the 

 young of all the native sparrows so far as known, the young 

 English Sparrows had taken 35 per cent vegetable food, 2 per 

 cent being weed seed and 33 per cent grain. The animal food 

 was made up entirely of insects and those were chiefly injurious. 

 One per cent of the food consisted of bugs, 3 per cent of ants 

 and other Hymenoptera, 4 per cent of Lepidoptera, 8 per cent 

 of beetles, and 49 per cent of grasshoppers. 



" Three-fourths of the beetles were weevils, and practically 

 all the grasshoppers were the short-horned (Acrididae), the 



