UTILITY OF BIRDS TO AGRICULTURE. 109 



England. It is easy to see then, how, when birds, the natural 

 enemies of insects, are destroyed and driven away, it will fol- 

 low that insects will increase, and an increase of insects is 

 synonymous with a decrease of crops. 



But there are to day many farmers in New England who do 

 not believe that birds are beneficial. They occasionally lose a 

 little corn by the crows, or a chicken by the hawks, and they 

 judge the whole class of birds by a few such unfair samples. 

 They drive the robins from the garden thinking they are pulling 

 up the seed, and they take every opportunity to drive from the 

 orchard the " sap-suckers," as they call the woodpeckers, think- 

 ing they are sucking the sap of the trees. 



To correct such mistakes, — to induce farmers to study more 

 the habits of birds, and to enable them more readily to distin- 

 guish the beneficial and injurious species, we shall give a brief 

 description of some of the commonest birds of Essex County. 



Accipiter Cooperii — Cassin. 



Cooper's Hawk. — This hawk is a common summer inhabitant 

 of Massachusetts, being the smallest of those hawks known to 

 the farmer by the significant name of " Hen Hawks." The 

 nest is usually formed in the deep woods, almost always in a 

 pine tree, in a fork near the top. It is constructed of large 

 sticks and twigs, and lined with leaves of different trees ; eggs, 

 from two to four ; color, a dirty white, with spots of brown and 

 lilac, in some specimens distinct, in others the spots are very 

 obscure. The breeding season in Massachusetts is about the 

 loth of May, but varies as the season is particularly late or 

 early. This species is very injurious, as also the two follow- 

 ing, partly on account of the havoc they make in the poultry- 

 yard, but especially because they destroy a large number 

 of small birds, which, if permitted to live, would do a great 

 deal of good. 



Accipiter fuscus — Bonaparte. 



Sharp-shinned Hawk. — This species makes its appearance 

 about the 1st of May, and throughout the whole season is en- 

 gaged in destroying small birds, which form a large part of its 

 food, although it occasionally captures a field-mouse of some 

 sort. Audubon describes the peculiar flight of this bird as fol- 



