oZZ Recent Literature. [April 



Mr. Baker starts out with the quotation of a leading ornithologist: 

 ''Of egg collectors we have many, of oologists, alas! but very few," which 

 he says is "a very true summing-up of the situation, however depressing 

 it may be." He goes on to say that the basal idea of those egg collectors 

 who have some object in view is to ascertain and record the color and 

 description of the eggs of each species of bird, but he adds, all such pre- 

 liminary work has already been done. The real work now is to discover 

 the underlying reasons for coloration and peculiar shape and the method 

 of adaptation and eliminative protection. There is also the study of 

 relationship in egg structure between birds of different families and genera 

 as an aid to working out the true classification of birds, as well as the study 

 of geographic variation in eggs in connection with the range of the species 

 and the recognition of subspecies. 



"The crudest and most deservedly abused form of collector," says Mr. 

 Baker, "is the man sets out with the ambition of filling one box or drawer 

 with the eggs of one species. Such collections merely form a mass of 

 beautiful dead things which gratify his eye and sense of possession." He 

 also warns against making a specialty of abnormal sets for such a collec- 

 tion, while it may be very beautiful is "scientifically almost useless," 

 since all scientific work must be done upon normal sets. 



There are great opportunities for developing "oologists" out of our host 

 of "egg collectors" if they are guided in the right paths, and Mr. Baker's 

 paper may be read with profit both by the collector and by those who are 

 opposed to collecting. Incidentally the journal in which the paper ap- 

 pears, 'The Oologists' Exchange and Mart,' 1 is an admirable little pub- 

 lication dealing with the serious side of egg collecting and well worthy of 

 perusal by American oologists. — W. S. 



Economic Ornithology in Recent Entomological Publications. — 



Allusions by entomologists to the bird enemies of various insects are cited 

 and discussed in the following paragraphs, each devoted to a different 

 insect or group of insects. 



False wireworms (Eleodcs) . — These are the larvae of beetles of the family 

 Tenebrionidae, which are injurious in western states to grain, fruit and 

 garden crops. The author of the paper reviewed 2 notes from various 

 sources that Burrowing Owls, Butcher Birds, Crows, Crow Blackbirds 

 and Red-headed Woodpeckers prey upon these beetles and further states 

 that adults have been found by the Biological Survey in stomachs of 

 13 species of birds. This record may now be considerably improved. 

 The most important economic species of false wireworm (Eleodes tricostata) 

 has been found in the stomachs of eight species of birds, as follows: Frank- 



1 The Oologists' Exchange and Mart. Kenneth L. Skinner, Editor, Brook- 

 lands Estate Office, Weybridge, England. Subscription, $1.25 per year. 



2 McColloch, J. W. Jonrn. Ec. Ent., Vol. II, No. 2, April 1918, pp. 219-220. 



