ripe wheat and oats, eating much and threshing out more, so that it is lost to its 

 hiwful owner, it is not to be wondered at that the farmer loses his temper and 

 says in his wrath that all birds are a nuisance ; but these birds also do some good, 

 though, as they have not acquired the knack of advertising it, their benefits are 

 <[uite overlooked. If their case is tried impartially it may be found that even the 

 Crow, like another celebrated personage, is not quite " so black as he is painted." 

 I do not think the merits of the crows, or any of the so-called blackbird family, 

 will be found sufficiently great to entitle them to protection, but their faults 

 scarcely warrant their extermination, except in the case of the cow-bird, to be 

 spoken of hereafter. 



Crow. Twenty-five years ago tlie Crows of the Province of Ontario were as 

 regularly migratory as the Robins. A few occasionally stayed through the winter 

 with us, and their doing so was considered a sign that we would have a mild 

 season. As the land has been brought under cultivation, and more particularly in 

 neighborhoods where market-gardening is carried on extensively, the number 

 remaining through the winter has steadily increased, so that the species may now 

 be considered a resident one. In the vicinity of Toronto vast flocks gather at the 

 close of the autumn, feeding on the refuse vegetables left in the market gardens 

 ■outside the city, and resorting at night to some of the pine woods still left stand- 

 ing. In these they roost all through the winter. They may sometimes be pinched 

 by hunger, but, unless the snow becomes too deep, they can generally get at the 

 piles of manure drawn out on the market gardens, and other refuge left about 

 the land. At this time they do no harm, and probably a little good, as they pick 

 up many mice and insects in their foraging, but when spring opens they again 

 jscatter over the country and seek their nesting places. Seeding operations are 

 now going on, and the first of the (brow's mischievous propensities asserts itself as 

 soon as the grain has absorbed sufficient moisture from the ground to become soft 

 and has slightly sprouted : then it becomes a favorite morsel for the crows. Corn 

 is preferred to any other grain. I have rarely found any quantity of any other 

 grain in the stomach of a Crow, and even when the birds have been seen feeding 

 among the hills of sprouting corn and have been shot right on the spot, I have 

 always found the stomach contained quite as large an amount of insect remains 

 as of corn, the cut-worm forming one of the Crow's choicest articles of diet, and 

 the (juestion arises as to whether it is not better to let the Crow have a little corn 

 and get rid of the cut-worm, than to let the cut-worm take oft' a lot of corn if we 

 get rid of the crow. Later on I will say something about the history of this same 

 cut- worm. It is always wisest " of two evils to choose the least," and it must be 

 conceded that the corn-eating propensity of the crow is an evil ; but it is certainly 

 less than the evil done by the cut-worm. So perhaps, so far as the Crow's 

 case goes here, it would be as well to call the balance even and give the Crow the 

 benefit of it. 



The next scene in the Crow's proceedings shows him with a lively and 

 decidedly hungry family of four or five little dihs, whose cravings demand con- 

 stant attention from their parents ; the variety ( if fi >■ mI supplied to these insatiable 

 youngsters will vary somewhat according to the locality in which they are placed ; 

 in any case, no more grain will be taken by the parent birds; their food now will 

 consist entirely of insects, mice and the young of other birds. Nor will they stop 

 at the young if they can catch an adult small bird. Sometimes they will try to 

 <'lude the viligance of an old lien and will snatch up her chickens more adroitly 

 than any hawk ; ducklings fall easy victims to their cunning. It is at this season 

 they do the greatest amount of mischief, by destroying the nests and j'oung of 

 more valuable biixla, particularly- of such as nest upon the ground. For this 



