October, '10] McATEE: bobwhite food 437 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 

 Food of the Bobwhite 



I must protest against the undue praise given by Prof. C. F. Hodge 

 to a paper ^ on the Food of the Bobwhite, published in the June 

 number of The Journal. This account adds nothing to the publi- 

 cations by Dr. Sylvester D. Judd of the U. S. Biological Survey, except 

 what is based on tests as to the choice of food by practically domesti- 

 cated birds. 



For many reasons feeding experiments with confined birds are 

 useless as furnishing analogies to the conduct of individuals of the 

 species under natural conditions. It is almost impossible whoUj^ to 

 remove the factor of human choice of the food. Moreover the usual 

 change in amount of exertion by the birds, the absence of enemies, 

 and other changed conditions make different impulses and behaviour 

 almost unavoidable and certainly result in a different attitude toward 

 food. There are no better illustrations of the effects of confinement 

 than animals in zoological gardens. As is well known, very few of 

 them get their natural diet and some, indeed, will not thrive on any 

 thing like their natural food, or conversely, they do thrive on a regimen 

 they never experience in nature. For instance, the anteaters and the 

 solenodon in captivity subsist on hard boiled eggs. Is it not just as 

 reasonable to draw an analogy here as in the case of quails fed clothes 

 moths, mosquitos and house flies? 



A few instances from records of feeding experiments by the Biolog- 

 ical Survey will further show the fallacy of basing conclusions as to 

 economic value on the behaviour of captive birds. A shrike wilhngly 

 devoured a goldfish and a black bass; items of food it probably never 

 gets in the wild state. A bluejay refused to eat acorns, dozens of 

 which were found in collected stomachs; disdained beech nuts, another 

 favorite natural food, and would not touch a hve English sparrow^ nor 

 a mouse, though both birds and mice have been found in the stomachs 

 of wild birds. A caged bluebird refused the ground beetle, Scarites 

 suhterraneus, but wild ones eat it. English sparrow^s w^ould not eat 

 dandelion heads, though free birds are commonly observed rifling 

 them of their seed. Bobwhites tested here refused plant lice; those 

 tested by Mrs. Nice ate them freely. A confined song sparrow^ rejected 



^ Food of the Bobwhite. Margaret Morse Nice, Clark University, Worcester, 

 Mass. With an introduction by C. F. Hodge. Joum. of Economic Entomology. 

 Vol. Ill, No. 3. June, 1910. Pp. 295-313. 

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