No. 20.] THE BIRDS OF CONNECTICUT. 297 



considered. In Victoria, on the other hand, steps were taken in 

 1895 to promote its increase in fruit and grain growing districts, 

 and this fact was used as an argument in its favor by persons 

 who were endeavoring to introduce it into some of the other 

 colonies. Western Australia has taken a firm stand on the ques- 

 tion, and Mr. R. Helms, Biologist of the Bureau of Agriculture 

 of that colony, who opposed the proposed importation, gives his 

 reasons as follows : ' Had I been asked fifteen or twenty years 

 ago what I had to say, I would probably have recommended their 

 introduction. But not so now. My experience has taught me 

 better. The birds were introduced more than fifteen years ago 

 into New Zealand, and now, like the thrushes, they have become 

 a pest to fruit growers. They have changed their habit, from 

 being principally insectivorous having become omnivorous.' 



" After due deliberation, the Government issued a proclama- 

 tion on January 22, 1896, declaring the Starling a destructive 

 bird, and absolutely prohibiting its importation into Western 

 Australia. Still more recently it has been condemned in Tas- 

 mania, where it is charged with committing depredations on 

 small fruits, cherries, and wheat. Its further distribution has 

 been discouraged ; and, when the question of introducing several 

 species of birds was under discussion at an agricultural conference 

 at Scottsdale on December 6, 1897, the Starling was promptly 

 rejected." (Palmer, "Danger of Introducing Noxious Animals 

 and Birds.") 



Since the above was written Starlings have multiplied greatly, 

 have spread to Rhode Island, western Massachusetts, New Jersey, 

 and Pennsylvania, and are frequently found in flocks of thousands 

 in fall, especially in the neighborhood of the salt marshes, where 

 they assemble for the night. Besides the actual damage which 

 they do to grain, etc., they seize all the hollow limbs in orchards, 

 which the far more useful native birds have been accustomed to 

 utilize for nesting; and more than once pairs of Starlings have 

 been seen to attack and drive away even such a powerful bird as 

 the Flicker from the cavity which it had just finished excavating. 

 In our own State Mr. Wilbur F. Smith has reported instances 

 of their damaging apples on the trees and of one having been 

 seen flying from a tree with a Robin's egg in its bill. (Bird-Lore, 

 X, 1908, p. 79.) Its enmity toward our other undesirable immi- 



