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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Dec. 1 



states we are in danger of this wild-animal freak legis- 

 lation. 



Yesterday I came upon a hawk with five dead chick- 

 ens around him, and a sixth so injured I had to kill it. 

 My timely arrival prevented further slaughter. I wish 

 I could present this hawk (indeed, all the hawks and 

 skunks around my place) to your Iowa critic. I notice 

 he refers you to Fisher's circular on hawks. Fisher's 

 work was long ago discredited as worthless— a waste 

 of good paper. His writings are valueless. As Editor 

 Robinson, who is one of the most cautious and conser- 

 vative, and, indeed, the leading poultry writer in our 

 country, recently said in Farm Poultry, " No sane farm- 

 er would follow the teachings of Fisher and his class 

 of Department of Agriculture scribblers." Please 

 note, I say his class, for not all the Department's 

 writers indorse his vagaries. In the first place, nega- 

 tive evidence does not amount to a row of pins except 

 as giving a hint or suggestion until positive evidence 

 can be obtained. Fisher s house of cards is buiit on 

 merely negative evidence, and long ago tumbled to 

 pieces in the face of positive evidence against his vain 

 theories. In the second place, it is not nature and 

 species that determine the diet of hawks and varmints 

 and other animals. It is environment, and that alone. 

 Vegetarian animals such as the horse and cow have 

 been known to become carnivorous when wrecked on 

 some barren and deserted island; and, having only fish 

 or other animals as food, they have subsisted on them; 

 and for a carnivorous animal such as a hawk or skunk 

 to change from one form of animal life to another is a 

 much smaller change. It does not require starvation, 

 but mere opportunity to cause such slight change. 



Primeval natural forest conditions are one set, and 

 destroyed forest and artificial civilized conditions 

 (farms) are an entirely different set. The balance of 

 nature has been destroyed, environment changed; the 

 elusive rabbit is supplanted by the non-elusive chick- 

 en. The hawk is not going to sit around hungry when 

 a chicken is in sight if he thinks the chicken is unpro- 

 tected; and, indeed, they are often bold enough to 

 make their raids when a man is near. It is locality, 

 environment, ease of capture, not species, that deter- 

 mine what variety of meat a hawk will eat. 



The statement that a hawk patrols a field in search 

 of field mice is not true. In the first place, patrol im- 

 plies intentional guardianship, whereas a hawk guards 

 nothing but its own nest. In the second place, the 

 hawk is not after field mice. It is after its breakfast, 

 dinner, supper, lunch, victuals, not voles. If a rabbit 

 incautiously ventures out and does not notice the 

 hawk, the rabbit, instead of the mouse, is promptly 

 taken. If a chicken comes into view, the chicken is 

 taken. Meat, not mouse, is what a hawk is after. 



In autumn, when the cornfields are bare and the 

 protecting corn-shocks are removed for shredding, the 

 field mice are suddenly exposed and easy of capture. 

 The hawk's stomach contents will then show field 

 mice; but when grass is long, and mice hide easily, 

 while the inexperienced young chicken has not yet 

 learned to be always on the watch, the chicken is the 

 easiest prey in sight, and the hawk takes it. That 

 chickens are the natural food of hawks, no chicken 

 will dispute. It will be uncertain about a crow; it will 

 be interested in a buzzard; but, if he catches sight of a 

 hawk near, the chicken of any size will let out a yell 

 and break for tall timber, and not stop to argue the 

 question. It knows the hawk is his foe, not friend, 

 and he does not care a rap what nature-lovers may 

 think the plan of the garden of Eden was. It knows 

 the plan of this present earth is " hawks eat chickens," 

 and it, at least, has sense enough to act on what it 

 knows. It may have been the plan of the garden of 

 Eden for the lion and lamb to lie down separately in 

 peace. The plan to-day, however, is for the lion and 

 lamb to lie down together with the lamb forever more 

 at peace— inside the lion. To sentimentalize about 

 hawks patrolling as guardians for men will never vi- 

 talize a valuable, pure-blooded dead chicken that the 

 hawk kills. On the other hand, if we cease to be na- 

 ture-lovers, and cease to sentimentalize, and become 

 pseudo-scientists, and "sic" one pest on another, 

 hawk against mouse, that is a cruel, bloodthirsty, and 

 also inefficient plan — certainly not the plan of the 

 garden of Eden. To be torn to pieces, limb from limb, 

 is worse than to be killed by artificial means. Would 

 you rather be shot, or killed by a lion? Not only can 

 man be more humane in destroying pests than are 

 birds or beasts of prey, but he can be more efi'ective. 

 He can kill off every pest, and he himself suivive in 

 better condition than ever. On the other hand, if 

 birds of prey really confined themselves to pests and 

 then really killed off the pests, you would then have 

 left on your hands a horde of birds of prey with no 

 food in sight. They would then give their entire at- 



tention to the poultry-yards, and, as Editor Robinson 

 well says, the last state of the poultryman would be 

 worse than his present state. Man, by his own skill, 

 must be his own defense against all nature, from this- 

 tles and typhoid to hyenas and hawks. He may make 

 use of an animal that is trained, controlled, as a hunt- 

 ing-dog or a trained falcon or hawk. But an uncon- 

 trolled wild dogorwild pigs or wild cats or wild hawks 

 are only a menace in a civilized, settled farming com- 

 munity. 



In closing, as regards the nonsense in Fisher's bulle- 

 tin on hawks, let me refer you to the August issue of 

 Farm Poultry. Genesis Farm. 



Greencastle, Ind., August 6, 1909. 



The above may be rather tough on the 

 hawks, but I think it is, perhaps, about right 

 after all. The article reminds me that I have 

 often wondered why my Florida chickens 

 pay no attention to turkey buzzards that 

 come around almost every day, and often 

 alight in the poultry-yard. How do they 

 know, when hawks and buzzards are but lit- 

 tle specks away up in the sky, that one is an 

 enemy and the other is not? The old rooster 

 will twist his head around on one side, get a 

 glimpse of the hawk, give a note of warning 

 which the others take up, especially the hens 

 with chickens, and in a jiffy they are all un- 

 der cover out of sight. In fact, I have left 

 bushes and scrub palmettos through all my 

 poultry-yard for shelter for the chickens. 

 Years ago I started the poultry business on 

 a small scale down in our basswood orchard. 

 I think it was when snow first fell that I came 

 near the chicken-house one day, which was 

 back in the woods among the basswood-trees. 

 Every thing was strangely silent. On look- 

 ing over the fence in a field I found the white 

 snow literally covered with blood, over quite 

 an area, and a half-dozen full-grown chickens, 

 or the mutilated remains of tnat many, were 

 scattered through the snow. The rest had 

 disappeared somewhere, and they were so 

 terribly frightened that some of them did not 

 come out of their hiding-places, as nearly as 

 I could determine, for nearly two days. That 

 one experience wound up my chicken spec- 

 ulation out in the \\ oods. No doubt hawks 

 j'ud skunks are sometimes a benefit to the 

 farmer; but after they have once made a raid 

 on the chickens I would recommend exter- 

 mination. 



EIGHT YEARS OLD AND STILL LAYING. 



I do not keep bees, but take Gleanings mostly for 

 the home and poultry departments. I should like 

 to say to Mr. A. I. Root that I have two Plymouth Rock 

 hens that are over eight years old, and they are among 

 my best layers. They have never raised a family of 

 chickens, and try to sit about only twice apiece each 

 year. I break them right up of wanting to sit, and soon 

 they are laying again. Mrs. Alice A. Kesler. 



Winnebago, Minn., Nov. 8. 



SWEET CLOVER, AND THE WAY IP IS BEGIN- 

 NING TO BE RECOGNIZED. 



A subscriber calls our attention to an arti- 

 cle on sweet clover, from Hoard's Dairyman 

 for July 21. He copies a part of it as follows: 



strange as the claims made by practical feeders for 

 the feeding value of sweet clover may seem, even 

 wider claims are made for it as a fertilizing agent. 

 Its fertilizing value is claimed to exceed its value as a 

 forage crop. Out here we recognize its fertilizing 

 value as very high — more so than that of any other 

 clover. C. H. Clark. 



Albia, Iowa, July 27. 



