BIRDS AND tNSFXTS 



the moths by night, and birds assemble from the 

 surrounding country and fall upon the caterpillars by 

 day. 



Flocks of starlings attack and devour them in great 

 quantities. Even the seed-eating birds lend a hand 

 and dispose of hosts of them. Yet I have seen pot- 

 hunting boys and grown men go out and shoot a 

 double charge of shot into a flock of starlings engaged 

 in this magnificent work. The dead and crippled 

 birds are gathered up ; numbers of wounded escape 

 to die miserably, and the flock departs terror stricken 

 to another part of the country. 



There are hundreds of species of weevils. They 

 are equally destructive in both the adult beetle and 

 larvae or grub stage. The larvae attack and voraciously 

 feed on peas, beans, and all kinds of grain, and the 

 beetles devour green crops, fruit trees, garden flowers, 

 and even invade the conservatories. They often strip 

 a tree bare of its buds, flowers, and shoots. When 

 birds assemble to feed on them, the untrained observer 

 declares the guilty parties are the birds, and forth- 

 with a brutal war of extermination is waged on our 

 allies. 



In a single season a fruit grower of my acquaintance 

 lost /.700 from the ravages of weevils. 



I have found weevils and their larvae, mostly the 

 former, in the stomachs of large numbers of South 

 African birds. Often the stomach contents were 

 90 per cent, weevils. 



Starlings prey largely on them, and they are right 

 royally reinforced by thrushes, chats, sparrows, finches, 



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