CORNELL 



R\iral School Leaflet 



[FOR BOYS AND GIRLS.] 



Published monthly by the New York State College of Agriculture at Cornell University, from 

 September to May, and enteed as secand-class matter September 30, 1907, at the Post Office 

 at Ithaca, New Yock, under the Act of Congress of July 16, 1^4. L. H. Bailey, Director 



ALICE G McCLOSKEY, Editor 



Professors G. F. WARREN, CHARLES H. TUCK, and C. EDWARD JONES, Advisers 



Vol. 3 ITHACA, N Y., OCTOBER, 1909 No. 2 



THE ENGLISH SPARROW 

 Arthur A. Allen- 



WHO does not know the little feathered immigrant, the 

 English Sparrow ? Summer and winter our eaves and 

 doorsteps resound with his boisterous chirp. Brought 

 into this country from Europe not sixty years ago, he 

 has become the commonest bird east of the Mississippi 

 river and is rapidly extending his range throughout the west. 



Some of the birds we have studied are typical of the woods, others 

 of the fields, but the English Sparrow is never at home far from the 

 abode of man. Wherever crack or cranny offers support, he builds his 

 bulky nest and rears his young. When suitable places about the house 

 and barn are exhausted, he learns to construct a huge, spherical nest 

 in the fork of a tree which he enters through an opening in one side. 

 Sometimes he even turns another bird out of its nest in order to use 

 the site. Nor is this the greatest of his faults, for he has many. Indeed, 

 were we to weigh them, I fear that his bad qualities would over- 

 balance his good ones. But even when we condemn him we must not 

 lose sight of his good qualities. 



It is true that the greater part of the food of the English Sparrow 

 consists of grain, which he very often rifles from the corncrib, the chicken 

 yard, or the grain fields. But on the other hand, he destroys many 

 seeds of weeds and many injurious insects, such as grasshoppers, cabbage 

 butterflies, and caterpillars. We know that when he becomes abun- 

 dant, his company becomes obnoxious to our native birds nesting 

 about the house, so that they either leave or are driven away. But 

 in the heart of our great cities, he fills a place that could be occupied 

 by no other bird, for no other bird could live under such conditions 

 of noise, dirt, and scarcity of food. Aiul to those persons who are forced 



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