The Canadian Florticultiirist. 



^11 



If it were not already, in its wild uncul- 

 tivated state, so good, we should have, 

 uncjuestionably, long ago, sought to 

 improve it. As it is, we find it nearly 

 everywhere north of the range of Pru- 

 nus domestica produced so abundantly 

 in its season as to be almost destitute 

 of any settled commercial value, which 

 can only be imparted to it by the pro- 

 duction of improved sorts, superior in 

 size, beauty and flavor to the too abun- 

 dant wild products. 



For canning or preserving, even these 

 are by many regarded as quite equal 

 to the Peach (as we get it); and, in fact, 

 superior to most of the fruit which 

 leaches us. But nothing is more evident 

 ihan the easy susceptibility of Primus 

 Americana to rapid improvement — 

 Vick's Masazine. 



A Nut for Defenders of the Sparrow. 



The amount of damage^ that the 

 English sparrow is capable of inllicting 

 is pretty plainly set forth by Thos. 

 Copsey, Hillsea Farms, Hants, in the 

 Mark Lane Express. He says : — In 

 one year — from September, 1886, to 

 March, 1887 — when my bird-catcher 

 refused to catch more for fear of the 

 informers, I paid him 4d. per dozen for 

 494 dozen and 10 sparrows, and this 

 spring I paid him for 198 dozen and 

 six sparrows at Id. per dozen, .£11 i is. 

 besides employing a man with a double- 

 barrel gun to shoot sparrows. We 

 have many fowls, and the plan was to 

 set long troughs to feed the fowls in, so 

 set that from port holes in a barn he 

 could sweep the troughs with sparrow 

 shot after the fowls had left. They 

 generally were swarming with sparrows, 

 and most charges brought down various 

 nnmbers — from six to twenty-eight. I 

 paid for 250 cartridges, if not over 300. 

 As no account was kept, the number 

 killed is but guess. We will say eight 

 on the average of 250 shots will be 

 2,000 birds ; bird-catchers 693 dozen, 

 equals 8,316; total, 10,316. 



My bird-catcher tells me that twenty 

 dozen sparrows ate three gallons of oats 



or two gallons of wheat daily when he 

 has to keep them a few days. 



I have entirely given up growing 

 wheat for years on our home farm. 

 On a five-acre p'ece of wheat (the last 

 grown in 1882) the ground, when the 

 wheat was reaped, could not be seen 

 for the chaff that the sparrows had 

 billed out. 'J'hey began to eat in the 

 soft milk, and continued till it was 

 carted when in shocks ; by eight o'clock 

 in the morning, from fifty to over one 

 hundred could be counted tlying off 

 from one shock. If the sparrow was a 

 friend to farmers, go back fifty years, 

 and it will be found the overseers of 

 every parish that I know of encouraged 

 all the boys to take sparrows, and gave 

 them sixpence per dozen for old spar- 

 rows, threepence per dozen for young 

 one?, and twopence per dozen for eggs. 

 I never saw the cornfields damaged 

 much at that time : the money was paid 

 out of the rates. 



The boys were afraid to take the 

 eggs, and catchers were afraid to catch 

 them in breeding-time, so that they 

 accumulated tenfold till the war had to 

 be opened afresh, and thousands of 

 guns are dealing destruction to the 

 spa'-rows; all round our stack-yards the 

 wounded groan, and cats get fat killing 

 and eating the wounded. What an 

 unkind set of people these wild bird 

 preservers are to cause the increase for 

 so cruel an end ! 



Friends of the Farmer. 



It may be an advantage to point 

 out some of the friends of the farmer, 

 which, conseiiuently, no farmer should 

 destroy or allow to be destroyed. 

 Among these are toads, which are, 

 under all circumstances, the farmer's 

 friend ; moles and field mice, probably, 

 do a vast deal more of good than harm ; 

 all birds, especially robins, wrens, 

 thrushes, orioles, cuckoos, phebes, blue 

 birds, woodpeckers, swallows and cat 

 birds. The destruction of all these 

 and many others, except for scientific 

 purposes, should be made, under very 

 heavy penalties, illegal in every .State. 



