130 



THE CANADIAN HORTTOULTURIST. 



ing the cockchafer grubs, that the rooks 

 are so well known to do in the wheat 

 fields. The turf, I should add, soon re- 

 gained its verdure, anfl the injured 

 patches were scarcely distinguishable 

 from the rest of the plot." 



Mr. Bree adds : " That there was 

 plenty of fruit in the garden, goose- 

 berries, currants, etc., which might have 

 been had wltliout trouble ; but the 

 blackl)irds preferred digging tlirough 

 the tui-f", tliat they might devour the 

 cockchafer grubs which were under it." 



Span ows ne.xt. Sparrows burrow in 

 the stacks and eat a great deal of corn, 

 it must be confes.sed ; and many otiier 

 small birds take great liberties with our 

 sproutiug crops, and eat the buds and 

 seeds of plants and trees. But on the 

 other hand, writes Stanley in his 

 " Familiar History of Birds," sparrows 

 feed their young thirty-six times in an 

 hour, whicli, calculating at the rate of 

 foail(!en hours a day, in long days of 

 summer, gives 3,500 times per wesik. 

 A number corroborated on the authority 

 of another writer, who calculated the 

 number of caterpdlars destroyed by one 

 pair of s})arrows in a week to be about 

 3,400. Redstarts were observed to feed 

 their young with little green griilis from 

 gooseberry trees twenty-three times in 

 the hour, which, at the .same calculation, 

 amounts to 2,24") times in a week ; but 

 more grubs than one were usually im- 

 ported each time. Chatiinches at the 

 rate of thirty-five times an houi- for ti*.e 

 or si.K tiuies t)gether. when they would 

 pause for the spicc; of ei^^ht or ten 

 minutes ; the fo.jd was green cater- 

 pillars. Tlie tit'uouse feeils the young 

 sixteen timi's in the hour. 



A single pair of sparrows, during the 

 time they are fee ling their young, will 

 destroy about 4,01)0 caterpillars per 

 wt;ek. They likewise feed thi'iu on 

 butterHics ami other winged in ecfcs, 

 every une of which, if not destroyed in 



this manner, would be productive of 

 several hundreds of caterpillars. Ex- 

 amining the sparrow's cro|», you will 

 find the larger portion of the contents 

 is insects, etc., above-named. 



And lastly, the fly-catcher. Thesje 

 birds may be seen watching for their 

 prev upon the V)ranch of a tree, darting 

 forth with wonderful swiftness when- 

 ever a fly [)asses near, catching it with 

 a snap of l)ill. and then returning to its 

 post. A single pair of fly-catchers has 

 been seen to feed their young no fewer 

 than 5.S7 times in one day with flies, 

 which, if they had not V)een destroyed, 

 woidd each have given birth to hundreds 

 of maggots Thus, on a moderate cal- 

 culation, one pair of birds will destroy, 

 in a single day, as many flies as would 

 produce I00,00:i caterpillai's. 



However, after the.se practical detuon- 

 strations and facts, suven of the farmei-s 

 were determined that they would still 

 proceed to destroy all small birds and 

 nests on their farms. They set to work 

 both with guns and poison, and also 

 offered rewards for all nests that the 

 villagers could bring in. By the.se 

 means thej^ killed immense numbers, 

 but the poison acted two ways, as one 

 man lost his three cats through their 

 eating the poisoned birds, and also lost 

 a brood of very fine, pure breed chickens, 

 which broke fence and got the poisoned 

 grain al.so. Their hedges were also very 

 much broken about by the boys while 

 nesting. At the end of the season tlu'y 

 had to bewail a considerable loss of 

 valuable time, besiiles being eaten up 

 with wire worm, grubs, caterpillars, etc., 

 as their fields yielded considerably less 

 per acre than on those farms where the 

 birds were allowed to go uinnolested. 

 Also, they had very little small fruit, 

 because the bushes were destroyed by 

 the Same pest. They, therefore, came 

 to the wi.se conclusion that they had 

 rather overdone the thinj;, and that iu 



