52 FRIENDS WORTH KNOWING. 



United States in summer, whose food, being nearly the 

 same, would swell the amount of vermin destroyed to 

 12,000,000,000. But the number of young birds may be 

 fairly estimated at double that of their parents; and as 

 these are constantly fed on larvae for three weeks, making 

 only the same allowance for them as for the older ones, 

 their share would amount to 42,000,000,000, making a 

 grand total of 54,000,000,000 of noxious insects destroyed 

 in the space of four months by this single species ! The 

 combined ravages of such a hideous host of vermin would 

 be sufficient to spread famine and desolation over a wide 

 extent of the richest, best-cultivated country on the earth." 



The yellow-headed blackbird, a kinsman of larger size, 

 belongs properly north-west of Lake Superior, but frequent- 

 ly gets into Michigan and Illinois. The bright yellow head 

 and neck make it very noticeable if seen. Its habits are 

 essentially those of the redwing. 



We have another set of blackbirds in the Atlantic States, 

 of greater size than the Agelcei, commonly known as "crow " 

 blackbirds, but called grakles in the books. There are sev- 

 eral species, but none are greatly different from that too- 

 common pest of our cornfields, the purple grakle. 



The real home of the grakles, although along the edges of 

 the swamps, is not among the reeds where the redwing and 



