Economic Reasons for Protection 99 



is greedily devoured. He once examined two 

 hundred pellets taken from the nesting site of 

 a pair of these owls in one of the towers of the 

 Smithsonian Institution. In these pellets he 

 found 454 skulls, of which 225 were those of 

 meadow mice, 2 of pine mice, 179 of house mice, 

 20 of rats, 6 of jumping mice, 20 of shrews, 1 of 

 a star-nosed mole, and 1 of a vesper sparrow. In 

 the retreat of another pair of these birds were 

 found more than three thousand skulls, 97 per 

 cent, of which were those of mammals, chiefly 

 field mice, house mice, and common rats. And 

 all this splendid work was done without the cost 

 of one penny to anyone. 



Best known perhaps of all our nocturnal birds 

 of prey, is the little screech owl, a bird whose 

 range covers the whole of the United States and 

 the southern portions of Canada. The farmer 

 who kills this useful little bird, or permits any- 

 one else on his farm to kill it, is woefully negligent 

 of his own interests. During the day there is 

 no sign of its presence, but at dusk it suddenly 

 appears in the entrance of its hiding place — a 

 hollow apple tree, or a hole in some outbuild- 

 ing perhaps — and without the slightest sound it 

 passes into the air. Silent as a puff of smoke, it 

 drifts through the orchard, over the barnyard, 

 and around the corn ricks, with bright eyes wide 



