42 THE IMPORTANCE OF BIRD LIFE 



order that both men and birds may have sufficient. 

 These precautions involve both time and money 

 and must be charged up against the birds. 



The controversy between poultry-raisers and 

 birds of prey has already been dealt with. The 

 honors are all with the hawks. Growers of grain, 

 however, have a better case, though not so well 

 proved as the case of the fruit men. There can be 

 no denying that birds destroy a certain amount of 

 grain. 



It is a mistaken idea, though a widely prevalent 

 one, that grain-eating birds always remain grain- 

 eaters, that the main food of crows, blackbirds, 

 and doves is wheat or oats. Nothing could be 

 further from the truth. 



Blackbirds, however, do sometimes eat freshly 

 planted or ripening grain. It is true that crows 

 consume thousands of bushels of unhusked corn in 

 the South each winter when it has been left in the 

 field by farmers who have not the time or inclina- 

 tion to husk it. Bobolinks as rice-birds annually 

 destroy about two million doll ars' worth of cereals 

 in the South. And grain makes up about 85 per 

 cent, of the food of the English sparrow. 



But, with the exception of one or two of the 

 above mentioned species, the birds have other 

 economic functions which more than counterbal- 

 ance their depredations. Only thirty-eight indi- 

 viduals out of the 645 collected on the famous 

 Maryland farm had taken grain, and grain made 



