THE JOURNAL OF THE 



WILD BIRD INVESTIGATION SOCIETY. 



IS THE MAGPIE AN INJURIOUS BIRD? 

 Bv L. T. THORNTON. 



HAT the Magpie is 

 a persecuted bird 

 many will doubt, 

 for numerous 

 writers have stated 

 that it destroys the 

 eggs of game and 

 other birds, that it 

 eats cherries, strips 

 rows of peas, and 

 attaci<s Iambs and weakly sheep by plucking 

 out iheir eves. Personally, I have always 

 been inclined to regard it as a species doing 

 more harm than good, though I cannot say I 

 have credited all the charges that have been 

 laid to its account. 



Some years ago Dr. CoUinge stated,' after 

 investigating the stomach contents : — " Apart 

 from the question of game', the magpie is a 

 bird ihal is beneficial to the agriculturist, 

 feeding, as ii does, largely upon soil larvae 

 and beetles, whilst it destroys field mice, 

 \()les, blackbirds, and wood pigeons." 



This o]iinion of our leading authority on 

 economic ornithology, made me c]uesti()n 

 whether I was acting in mv own interests by 

 destroying these birds. A little later I came 

 across the following passage in Yarrell's 

 lirilish Hirds : — " The example set by the 

 thrifty husbandmen of France, Belgium and 

 Scandinavia shows that the presence of this 

 bird is not fraught with so much danger to 

 their li\e stock as its persecutors would make 



1 The Food of Some British Wild Birds, 1913, p. 53. 



out, for in all these lands, and especially m 

 Sweden and Norway, it is the tolerated, if not 

 the cherished, neighbour of every farmer, its 

 depredations being practically unfelt." 



After reading the above paragraph and 

 noting the food items as scheduled by Dr. 

 Collinge, I decided to keep a record of the 

 stomach contents of all the specimens I could 

 obtain. I have now examined upwards of 

 sixty from a district where it is destroyed by 

 both farmers and gamekeepers, and as a 

 result I am convinced that mv former opinion 

 is wrtjng, and I fullv agree with Dr. 

 Collinge's conclusions. 



Some few remarks on the stomach contents 

 may be of interest. In only three cases have 

 I found remains of the egg-shells of game 

 birds, but on five occasions I have found 

 traces of wood-pigeon's eggs, and on four 

 those of the blackbird. The bulk of the food, 

 however, has consisted of insects and their 

 larvae, including the wireworm and Turnip 

 Dart Moth. In twenty stomachs the Cock- 

 chafer or its larvae was present. Caterpillars 

 of surface-feeding species were present in 

 twenty-three cases, and numerous beetles 

 which I was unable to identify. Leather- 

 jackets, the larvae of the Crane Fly, were 

 found on seven occasions and in large quanti- 

 ties. The Long-tailed Field Mouse was 

 present in nine stomachs. 



Specimens obtained in an adjacent wood 

 contained many examples of what we term 

 Snout-beetles (weevils), and were probably 



[J.W.B.I.S., March, 1920, vol. i. No. 2.] 



