126 
examination it was found that it had killed the first five, the head having 
been completely pulled off in one case. While following a plow in a 
badly infested field May 11, 1916, at Rockton, Ill., the writer saw many 
grubs with crushed heads, and three or four sparrows were noticed to be 
actively engaged pecking at the grubs as soon as they were turned out 
by the plow, seldom eating one but seeming to delight in pecking into 
their heads. At Lafayette, Ind., May 14, 1891, Prof. F. M. Webster 
saw an English sparrow feeding on Phyllophaga beetles which had 
fallen to the ground beneath an electric light the night before, and this 
observation has been made by others also. 
A gull, supposedly Franklin’s gull (Larus franklini), has been re- 
ported from various places in Nebraska, Iowa, and South Dakota as 
very fond of grubs. Mr. C. N. Ainslie saw flocks of gulls following 
the plow in infested fields at Elk Point, S. Dak., in May, 1913. They 
appeared.to feed exclusively when on the wing, swooping close to the 
ground and capturing the grub without alighting. In 1912 white-grubs 
were very destructive near Tabor, S. Dak., and the owner of a badly 
infested farm told the writer of the great value of the gulls and black- 
birds in destroying the grubs behind a plow or cultivator. His observa- 
tions on the habits of the gulls agreed with those of Mr. Ainslie, and 
the blackbirds in flying to the furrows and back to a near-by grove 
formed a black unbroken ellipse. 
In a letter to the Bureau of Entomology dated June 18, 1910, Mr. 
C. H. Loomis, of Platteville, Wis., refers to pigeons, as well as to crows 
and blackbirds, as actively feeding on grubs turned up by the plow. 
Other birds which have been reported to feed on white-grubs or 
May-beetles are the red-bellied woodpecker (Centurus carolinus) and 
the red-headed woodpecker (Melanerpes erythrocephalus), according 
to the observations of Townend Glover (32); the blue jay (Cyanocitta 
cristata), “golden woodpecker” (Colaptes auratus?), according to Har- 
gitt (38) ; chuck-wills widow (Antrostomus carolinensis), according to 
Dr. C. V. Riley (62) ; the catbird (Dumatella carolinensis), wood thrush 
(Hylocichla mustelina), and hermit thrush (H. guttata), according to 
Dr. S. A. Forbes (23, 25); and several grackles-(Quiscalus macrourus, 
Q. quiscula aeneus, Q. quiscula aglaeus, QO. major, the common ani (Cro- 
tophaga ani),and the grooved-bill ani (C sulcirostris), the laughing gull 
(Larus atricilla,) the Virginia rail (Rallus virginianus,) meadow-lark 
(Sturnella magna argutula), sora (Porzana carolina), and the rice bird 
(Dolichonyx orysivorus), according to observations made in Louisiana 
by Prof. G. E. Beyer (77). Crotophaga ani and Holoquiscalus brachyp- 
terus) feed on white-grubs in Porto Rico, according to Van Dine (77). 
While many of the above-mentioned birds are active grub-destroyers 
in the field, probably no one of them compares with the robin in its 
ability to detect and unearth grubs in lawns, a fact which makes them 
doubly valuable since grubs are much more difficult to control in grass 
lands than in cultivated fields. Evidently robins detect the grub by their 
keen sense of hearing, and having once ascertained its location they 
