FINCHES i8i 



small numbers of these birds can bring about in 

 the budding gooseberry-bushes and cherry-trees. 

 For the most ardent bird lover must admit that the 

 Bullfinch, beautiful as he may be, is a terribly 

 destructive bird, and when the gardener finds the 

 fruit-bearing trees entirely denuded, he can hardly 

 be expected to accept the kindly theory that every 

 incipient blossom contained the eggs or larvae of 

 some deleterious insect. At the same time, it must 

 be remembered that the Bullfinch performs an 

 immense service in the country by destroying the 

 seeds of numberless noxious plants, which \\ould 

 otherwise be spread broadcast over the cultivated 

 grounds, and in this way his adverse balance is 

 somewhat redressed. 



The fondness of the Bullfinch for the seeds of 

 the dock renders him an easy prey to the bird- 

 catcher. A bunch of these plants is bound about 

 a sharpened stake, which may readily be driven 

 into the ground wherever the birds are heard or 

 seen. A call-bird in a small cage is placed beneath 

 the drooping sprays, and to each seed-plume a limed 

 rush is affixed. In a few moments the notes of the 

 decoy are responded to from the wood, and the wild 

 bird flies nearer and nearer, and at length descends 

 boldly on the fatal sprays. With the exception of 

 the Robin, which attacks the caged decoy with 

 unbridled fury, believing it to be an invader, few 

 birds are led to their undoing more easily than the 

 Bullfinch. 



The nest of this species is small in relation to the 

 size of the bird, and is somewhat unusual in con- 

 struction. A platform of twigs most carefully in- 



