154 The Food of Birds. 



tera and Arachnida to about their usual figure, we notice 

 the large ratios of June-beetles (twelve per cent.) and Or- 

 thoptera (twenty-seven per cent.). The latter includes 

 seven per cent, of Udeopsylla nigra., a large cricket-like 

 locust. We find also a trace of raspberries in the food of 

 two individuals. The caterpillars eaten by these birds 

 were unrecognizable, except those from a single stomach, 

 which Professor Riley has identified as Nephelodes violans^ 

 Guen. The record of benefit and injury is now more fa- 

 vorable to the species, — sixty-seyen per cent, of injurious 

 insects, and only fourteen per cent, beneficial, the latter 

 Carabidae and spiders. 



August. 



Twelve specimens were obtained in August, at Normal, 

 three early in the month and the others on the 29tli and 

 30th. The bluebirds were at this time most abundant in 

 meadows and pastures ; and the contents of their stomachs 

 indicate that the chief business of the month was the pur- 

 suit of locusts, crickets and grasshoppers, moths and cat- 

 erpillars. The Orthoptera eaten by these birds amounted 

 to fifty-eight per cent, of their food, and the Lepidoptera 

 to twenty-seven per cent. About half of the former were 

 Gryllidae (Gryllus and Nemobius), and the remaining half 

 were equally Locustidae andAcrididae {Xiphidium fascia- 

 tum and ensifer^ Caloptenus femur-riihrum and hivittata., 

 and (Edipodasordida). Half of the Lepidoptera were un- 

 recognizable moths, and the remainder caterpillars — five 

 per cent, being Noctuidae. Ants were about one per cent, 

 of the food, Coleoptera only five per cent, (including three 

 percent. Harpalidce),Pentatomidae ( Coenus delius) one per 

 cent, and spiders six per cent. A few wild cherries and 

 elderberries were the only fruits taken. The beneficial 

 elements thus amounted to nine or ten per cent, of the food 

 and the injurious elements to about eighty-five per cent. 



Sep tern her . 



All but one of the ten specimens upon which the account 

 of the September food is based were shot at Normal, and 

 all but two on the 29th of the month. The chief peculiarity 



