8 CATBIRD 



as much wild fruit as cultivated. He is reported 

 to do much more harm in the central United 

 States, where wild fruits are scarce, than near 

 the coast, where they are abundant. Mr. Judd 

 suggests that where he does damage to cherries 

 and strawberries, such crops can be protected by 

 planting the prolific Russian mulberry, which also 

 affords good food for domestic fowls. In speak- 

 ing of the Catbird's diet, Mr. Nehrling, who has 

 made a sjDecial study of the food of birds, assures 

 us that the Catbird's '' usefulness as a destroyer of 

 innumerable noxious insects cannot be estimated 

 too highly," that " it is a service compared with 

 which the small allowance of fruit it steals is of 

 little importance ; " for " from early morning to 

 sunset it watches over the fruit-trees and kills 

 the insects that would destroy them or their 

 fruit." " Of course it takes its share, especially 

 of cherries, but for every one it takes, it eats 

 thousands of insects ; " and the economist con- 

 cludes wisely, " Where there are no small birds 

 there will be little fruit." When feeding their 

 young, the Catbirds are continually bringing them 

 numbers of caterpillars, grasshoppers, moths, bee- 

 tles, spiders, and other insects, and in the south 

 the numbers are doubled, as the birds raise two' 

 broods. 



The old birds often begin preparing for the 

 second famil}^ a few days after the first has left 

 the nest ; but, while the female is engaged, the 



