Bird Notes and News 



45 



Economic Ornithology. 



From correspondents of the R.S.P.B. : — 



" You may like to know that one of the 

 parish grandfathers, who has all his life 

 waged war upon the birds that ate his peas, 

 has this year been obliged by increasing 

 physical infirmity to resort to more peace- 

 ful methods. He put saucers of water 

 between the rows, and the birds have left 

 the peas alone." 



" A friend of mine says her gooseberry 

 trees are being devoured by caterpillars. 

 The bushes are under a cage ; and though 

 the door is open during the winter the birds 

 do not enter freely enough to save them 

 from the plague." 



From Mr. S. L. Mosley, Huddersfield : — 

 " A friend of mine who is a gardener 

 told me that two summers ago a pair of 

 Blue Tits nested in a wall adjoining his 

 garden. One of these greenhouses was 

 very badly infested with green-fly. One 

 day when the Tits were about he shut 

 down the ventilators, opened the door of 

 the infested house, and with the assistance 

 of one of his men and a little patient and 

 gentle manoeuvring, managed to get a Tit 

 into the greenhouse. He then shut the door 

 and left it for nearly an hour. At the end 

 of that time he opened the ventilators. 

 Presently the bird came out and flew away. 

 But soon it returned with its partner, and 

 they both entered the house and remained 

 some time. This was the first of many 

 visits, and in less than a week scarcely a 

 green-fly could be found in the greenhouse." 



BIRDS AND FRUIT. 



" In July the fruit-eating birds take their 



fullest toll from the crops that they have 



helped to defend from insect pests. Small 



birds of normally blameless character are 



corrupted by the wealth of temptation at 

 this season, and join the Blackbirds in 

 attacks on the gardeners' beds. Robins and 

 Willow-Wrens eat red currants, and the 

 slender broods of young Willow-Wrens slip 

 easily through netting of ordinary mesh. 



" The total damage done by Robins and 

 Willow-Wrens is small, and is made good 

 many times over by their destruction of 

 caterpillars. Even at the height of the 

 fruit-season the tap, tap of the Thrushes can 

 be heard about the garden as they break up 

 snails on their chosen anvil-stones. Black- 

 birds are the largest consumers of fruit in 

 most gardens, and do serious damage where 

 there is ample cover for their nesting in 

 neighbouring copses,* hedges, and shrub- 

 beries. But they are home-keeping birds, 

 and help to destroy pests in the same 

 gardens where they take their pay. . . . 



"Fruit farmers are apt to attack the 

 Wild Birds Protection Acts as responsible 

 for the undoubted increase of fruit-eating 

 birds in many districts. In the case of the 

 most mischievous species the influence of 

 those Acts is probably almost immaterial. 

 The multiplication of Starlings cannot be 

 accounted for satisfactorily by any one 

 cause, and certainly there is no reason to 

 suppose that any protection afforded by the 

 Acts is the secret of their increase. . . . 

 The prime cause of the increase of Black- 

 birds, Bullfinches, and other birds which 

 attack fruit or fruit-trees is the increase of 

 the fruit and trees which they attack. 



" It must be remembered that fruit is 

 not the staple food of any British bird Year 

 in, year out, most of the fruit-robbers live 

 on worms, slugs, caterpillars, and insects ; 

 fruit is an intermittent luxury during the 

 summer months." — Times, July 8th, 1914. 



