134 



INJURIOUS INSECTS OF 1904. 



and breast bright yellow, with a jet black collar or cravat on breast in 

 form of a crescent ; all but the central tail feathers showing consider- 

 able white. Length, ten to eleven inches. It nests upon the ground, 

 and seldom perches on trees. Analyses of stomach contents give 

 interesting results: Two hundred and thirty-eight stomachs exam- 

 ined contained seventy-three per cent animal matter, and twenty- 

 seven per cent vegetable, the latter being found in the winter. The 

 animal food consisted of insects of the ground species — beetles, bugs, 

 grasshoppers, caterpillars, and a few flies, wasps and spiders, A 

 number of the stomachs were taken from birds killed when the 

 ground was covered with snow, but still contained a large per- 

 centage of insects. Crickets and grasshoppers constitute twenty- 

 nine per cent of the entire year's food, and sixty-nine per cent of the 

 food in August. Twenty-one per cent of beetles was found, of which 

 about one-third are predaceous ground beetles; the others all harm- 

 ful species. In May caterpillars constitute over twenty-eight per 

 cent of the whole food, with a large number of cutworms. Grain 

 makes up fourteen per cent, and weed and other seeds twelve per 

 cent. 



VESPER SPARROW, VESPER BIRD, GRASS FINCH, BAY- 

 WINGED BUNTING. 



Fig. 129. — Vesper Sparrow. From Coues, "Key to North American Birds." 



