10 BULLETIN 162, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



seeds that only a very small fraction of them can find room to germi- 

 nate, and the seeds picked up by birds, which never glean thoroughly, 

 only leave room for others to grow. I doubt if even a square foot of 

 ground has ever been kept clear of weeds by birds. The hoe and the 

 cultivator will always have to be used. But bobwhite has a fine 

 score to his credit as a destroyer of grasshoppers, locusts, potato 

 beetles, plant lice, and other injurious insects. 



It has been suggested by some bird protectionists that the bobwhite 

 should be removed from the game-bird list and be rigidly protected 

 at all seasons as a song bird and an insectivorous bird. But we must 

 not lose sight of its economic value as a game bird and the pleasure 

 and healthful exercise that it gives to thousands of sportsmen. There 

 are hundreds of other birds that bring joy to the hearts of amateur 

 bird admirers and many others that are nearly or quite as useful as 

 insect destroyers, so why should we deprive the sportsmen of their 

 most popular upland game bird, when they have not more than two 

 or three species at best in any one section of the country? Edward 

 H. Forbush (1927) has summed up the matter very well, as follows: 



As a popular game bird of the open country Bob-white has no rival. Probably 

 about 500,000 sportsmen now go out annually from cities east of the Rocky 

 Mountains to hunt this bird. This necessitates a great annual expenditure for 

 hunters' clothing, guns, ammunition, dogs, and guides. It adds to the revenue 

 of farmers and country hostelries. In some of the southern states Bob-white 

 pays the taxes on many farms where the farmers sell their shooting rights 

 to sportsmen. Perhaps there is no bird to which the American people are more 

 deeply indebted for both aesthetic and material benefits. He is the most 

 democratic and ubiquitous of all our game birds. He is not a bird of desert, 

 wilderness, or mountain peak which one must go far to find. He seeks the 

 home, farm, garden, and field ; he is the friend and companion of mankind ; 

 a much needed helper on the farm; a destroyer of insect pests and weeds; 

 a swift flying game bird, lying well to a dog; and, last as well as least, good 

 food, a savory morsel, nutritious and digestible. 



One does not have to go far afield to find the haunts of bobwhites, 

 for they shun the deep forest areas, seldom resort to the woods except 

 to escape from danger, and are rarely found on the wide open 

 prairies. They seem to love the society of human beings and their 

 cultivated fields. During spring and summer they are particularly 

 domestic and sociable, when it is no uncommon occurrence to hear 

 their loud, ringing calls almost under our windows, to see one perched 

 on a fence post near the house or on the low branch of an apple tree 

 in the orchard, or to find them running along the driveway or a 

 garden path. They are very tame and confiding at that season and 

 seem to know that they are safe. At other seasons they resort to more 

 open country and seek more seclusion. In New England they prefer 

 the vicinity of farms, where they find suitable feeding grounds in old 

 weed patches and stubble fields where crops of buckwheat, millet, 



