138 The Food of Birds. 



Two of these liirds were taken in April, five in Maj^, six in 

 June, six in July, two in August and one in September. 

 I shall not attempt to follow the food of the species through 

 these months, or to give its seasonal variations; but will 

 content myself with a general statement of the food of the 

 year as indicated by the contents of the stomachs of these 

 twenty-two birds. Seventy-one per cent, of their food con- 

 sisted of insects and twenty per cent, of fruit, a small ra- 

 tio of spiders and mollusks and an unusually large percent- 

 age of Myriapoda making up the remainder. The four 

 higher orders of insects occur in about equal quantities, 

 the proportion of ants and crane-flies being extraordinary. 

 Blackberries, strawberries, cherries and gooseberries ap- 

 pear among the fruits. Myriapoda amount to twelve per 

 cent. — nearly all Polydesmus and lulus. The two jDarts of 

 Arachnida included a few harvest-men. Orthoptera and 

 Hemiptera are respectively six and one per cent. ; and 

 snout-beetles and wireworms thirteen j)er cent. A few 

 June-beetles had been taken, and one of the birds from 

 northern Illinois had stuffed itself with rose-beetles {Ma- 

 cfodactylus suhspinosus) . Geotrupes and Onthophagus 

 were noticed among the other Scarabasidae. The Carabidas 

 amounted to six per cent, of the food, including Evarthrus, 

 Pterostichus, Harpalus, Anisodactylus and Bradycellus. 

 Ooleoptera make eighteen iDer cent, of the food and Dip- 

 tera twelve per cent., chiefly crane-flies and the larvae of 

 Bihio alhipennis. Lepidoptera were taken in about the 

 same amount, one-third being recognized as cutworms, 

 while ants reached the unusual average of fifteen per cent. 

 Helix lahyrinthiea^ Pupilla fallax and a few other uni- 

 valve mollusks made one per cent, of the food. Compared 

 with other Turdida?, we find the general insect average 

 unusual, exceeding that of the robin. It agrees with, and 

 even surpasses, the catbird in its preference for ants; 

 and with the robin in the ratios of Lepidoptera, Diptera, 

 Ooleoptera, Carabida? and Scarabaeidae. It differs from 

 the robin in its taste for ants and in the smaller ratio of 

 fruits ; and far surpasses all the other thrushes in the num- 

 ber of Myriapoda eaten in spring. In fact, the mid- 

 summer fruits seem to replace these spring Myriapoda, 



