306 Recent Literature. [April 



worms near Lawrence, Kansas, has had the same result as those made by 

 several previous students, among whom were Riley, Forbes and Forbush. 

 The following summary of the matter is quoted and abstracted from a 

 report : by Mr. Walter H. Wellhouse. 



" Next to unfavorable weather, the birds are the most important natural 

 enemies of the cankerworms. Probably no insect is a favorite food of more 

 species of birds than the cankerworm larva. It lives exposed on the out- 

 side of twigs and leaves where the birds can easily secure it, and is without 

 distasteful hairs or spines on its integument. The English Sparrow, which 

 is said to have been imported into America to check the ravages of this 

 insect, is no doubt our most efficient cankerworm eater in the cities. We 

 have watched these much-despised birds picking larva? from the elms at 

 all hours of the day from early morning to twilight, and even during rains. 

 The Robin is also an efficient destroyer of cankerworms, especially of the 

 moths which are found at the base of the tree. The writer has seen flocks 

 of Bronzed Grackles alight in the tall elms in Lawrence, and, moving from 

 branch to branch, noisily devour great numbers of larva?. Having 

 exhausted the supply on one tree they moved in concert to another tree to 

 continue the feast. 



" Many of the more timid birds which are not found in the cities so com- 

 monly as the English Sparrow and Robin are just as efficient enemies in the 

 country. 



" Mr. C. D. Bunker, curator of mammals in the Dyche Museum, secured 

 a hundred birds from a grove four miles from Lawrence and carefully esti- 

 mated the percentage of cankerworm larva? found in their stomachs. They 

 were taken near the edge of the timber where they could easily have 

 returned from the surrounding fields with other food, and the grove is 

 composed of several species of trees, only a small per cent being elms in- 

 fested with cankerworms." 



The hundred bird stomachs reported upon represent 39 species of birds, 

 all but three of which had eaten cankerworms. Eighteen of the species 

 had at least one individual which had eaten 100% cankerworms. Includ- 

 ing birds previously mentioned in the literature as enemies of cankerworms 

 the list now totals 75 species. 



White Grubs. — Mr. Norman Criddle has an extremely interesting note 

 on the bird enemies of white grubs (larva? of Phyllophaga spp.) in a recent 

 article 2 on these pests in Manitoba. He notes that 



" Robins are eager seekers after White Grubs, and have been known to 

 frequent infested fields for weeks. Crows, apart from their habit of fol- 

 lowing the plough, are also very useful as grub searchers; the same may 

 be said of Flickers." 



The following extract contains a specific recommendation that farm 



i Bull. Univ. Kans. Vol. 18, No. 1, Oct., 1917, pp. 301-302, Wellhouse, Walter H. 

 2 Agr. Gaz. Can. Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1918, pp. 449-454. 



