3l6 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Prof. Washburn : I came here to discuss this paper because 

 I thought every one would be the friend of the sparrow, and I 

 came here to talk against it, and I find the lady has given the sub- 

 ject careful thought and study, and her conclusions are on the right 

 side. We know he is a nuisance, and we know the sparrow is at 

 hand when the birds build their nests and lay their eggs to destroy 

 them, and at a time when most other birds are helping the farmer and 

 horticulturist and paying him back for what they have taken the 

 English sparrow keeps on levying his tribute on the farmer just 

 the same. I have received letters asking how to get rid of the 

 English sparrow, and I tell them to pull down the nests. Another 

 man said he got rid of them by throwing firecrackers around the 

 nest. One other Doint spoken of in this connection, and that was in 

 regard to poisoning them. That is not a pleasant way, but it is 

 sometimes desirable. The method of poisoning them is to use 

 strychnine on wheat. First, give them some wheat without poison 

 so they will be attracted, and then when strychnine is used they will 

 die before the other birds and frighten them away. This may seem 

 barbarous to the ladies. I thought the lady would make a plea for 

 the sparrow, and I came here for the purpose of annihilating the 

 paper. 



Mrs. Kingsbury : Only a few years ago when we lived at 

 Merriam Park we had some fifteen or twenty native trees on our 

 grounds. In a short time we had many song birds, bluebirds, wrens, 

 and one season we had a scarlet tanager, a pair of catbirds and a 

 pair of indigo birds, and we took great interest in those birds and 

 did everything to make them comfortably situated on our premises. 

 We put up houses for the wrens and bluebirds, and they took 

 possession. For two or three years they came back regularly and 

 nested there, and then a pair of English sparrows made their appear- 

 ance. We tried to get rid of them but did not succeed, the succeed- 

 ing year they came back in greater numbers, and last year they 

 came in an army. I think they all came from one pair of sparrows. 

 The result was they drove away the other birds. The robins they 

 could not dislodge, and the blue jays stayed with us. We tried for a 

 long time to scare them away without taking down their nests, but 

 we finally took down all their houses and that discouraged them 

 somewhat, but they only went over to the neighbors' and built 

 houses about the size of bushel baskets — perhaps not quite so large. 

 The wrens returned about two years ago, and we put up houses 

 for them with openings that no sparrow could enter. They are 

 still with us and the only song bird except the robin that we have 

 the hope of entertaining. 



I would like to tell these people of the experience they had at 

 Duluth. The sparrows become such a nuisance in the train sheds 

 at the railroad depot that they tried every way to get rid of them. 

 They would give them poison, but it did not seem to diminish thejr 

 number, when some man hit upon the plan of soaking grain in 

 whiskey, which made them drunk, when they were gathered up in 

 large quantities and disposed of. Perhaps that would be as easy 

 and as humane a way as any to dispose of them. 



