31 



caterpillar. A friend noticed a large caterpillar's nest at the 

 top of a tree in his apple orchard, and while wondering how it 

 could be reached he saw that an oriole had flown into the tree 

 and had gone at once to the nest which it soon tore open with 

 its bill and then proceeded to devour the occupants. It flew 

 away, but returned speedily with its mate, when the two con- 

 tined to feast upon the caterpillars until apparently not a 

 single one was left. 1 



For five years my own orchard was kept practically free of 

 caterpillars by birds. In the spring of 1905 there were two 

 nests which appeared to have escaped the attacks of birds, and 

 one day I concluded to remove them, but was called to lunch 

 and left the trees for half an hour. Upon my return the largest 

 tent had been torn open and many dead caterpillars were 

 scattered about mutilated in the manner characteristic of the 

 Baltimore oriole. Several large holes in the web showed how 

 they had been extracted. Many caterpillars were lying dead 

 upon the ground. The tents were left to the tender mercy of 

 the birds, and the occupants were destroyed by them. 2 Many 

 people have observed this habit of the Baltimore oriole. 



Mr. A. W. Butler, in speaking of the yellow-billed cuckoo, 

 says that he has known it to destroy every tent caterpillar in a 

 badly infested orchard, and tear up all the nests in half a 

 day. 3 



Mr. Harry G. Higbee, superintendent of the Bird Sanctuary 

 of the Massachusetts Audubon Society, at Sharon, Massachu- 

 setts, wrote on May 31, 1919, that many nests of tent cater- 

 pillars had been noted there early in the season. But he had 

 watched cuckoos puncturing them and eating the caterpillars. 

 Cuckoos had been so numerous there that the injury by this 

 caterpillar had practically ceased. 



Mr. Henry H. Seaver of Templeton, Massachusetts, asserts 

 that a family of starlings which had built a nest in the wain- 

 scoting of a room in his house destroyed a small colony of the 

 destructive introduced brown-tail moth (Euproctis chrysorrhoea.) 

 The starlings found an entrance to the house through a waste- 



i Cultivator and Country Gentleman, Vol. XLIV, 1879, p. 407. 



Useful Birds and their Protection, Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture, 1907, pp. 117, 

 118. 

 1 Report, Indiana Department of Geology, Natural Resources of Indiana, 1897 (1898), p. 824. 



