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snow. Cats are turned out by people who wish to get rid of 

 them. Many are abandoned by city people when going back 

 to town from their summer homes. Some may take to the 

 woods from choice. All this is bad for the birds. Many such 

 cats inhabit the woods and thickets about Wareham, living on 

 birds, mice, squirrels and insects; haunting back yards, poultry 

 coops and barns; stealing any food that may be left in exposed 

 situations; making the raising of chickens a precarious busi- 

 ness; and even killing rabbits, pheasants, partridges and half- 

 grown fowls. Such cats are largely responsible for the fact 

 that many of the ground-breeding and bush-inhabiting birds 

 in our neighborhood have been killed or driven away. Care- 

 ful investigation will show a somewhat similar condition in 

 many neighborhoods. For this there is only one remedy, 

 these cats must be exterminated. 



Twenty years ago the English sparrow would have been 

 placed first on the list, but it is not now so serious a menace 

 to our native birds as then. The conditions for its increase 

 are not generally so favorable as they then were, and its ene- 

 mies are more in the ascendant. It should not be tolerated, 

 however, by any one living in the country who prefers the 

 presence of our many beautiful and far more useful native 

 species. If its presence is allowed, it is likely to drive out all 

 those native birds that nest in or about buildings or in bird 

 houses. It also annoys many other birds, and drives them 

 from the neighborhood of our homes. I have now driven it 

 out of this neighborhood, but its former presence accounts 

 for the absence of wrens, bluebirds, phoebes and swallows, 

 which no doubt once bred here, and may now be induced to 

 return. The sparrows according to the testimony of many 

 observers do not kill the native birds and their young to the 

 extent that they did some years ago; but they often destroy 

 the nests of other birds, and they still persist in following or 

 mobbing birds of other species, and compelling them to move 

 on. If their nests are destroyed and the birds shot whenever 

 occasion offers, the survivors usually learn to keep away. 



In speaking of the gunner as an enemy of birds, it may be 

 well to except the honest sportsman, who complies with the 

 law, respects the rights of property, and is intelligent enough 



