BIRDS AND THEIR RELATIONS TO MAN 5 



feathers. On the other hand, those who keep birds for pleasure 

 find their greatest enjoyment in breeding them with colors and 

 markings difficult to produce. Choice specimens of fancy-bred 

 birds bring prices many times greater than the value of their 

 flesh and eggs for food and of their feathers for use or orna- 

 ment. Fancy feathers have no more value than others except 

 on the living birds. 



While those who keep birds for pleasure nowadays give most 

 attention to breeding fancy stock for exhibition, several kinds of 

 pigeons are kept to entertain by their flying performances ; 

 and outside of the limited class of those who breed them es- 

 pecially for exhibition canaries are valued according to ability 

 to sing. The brutal sport of cockfighting was a popular pastime 

 with our ancestors until prohibited by law, and is still prevalent 

 in many lands. In early times birds of prey were captured when 

 very young and carefully trained to hunt for their masters. 

 Under the feudal system there were regulations prescribing the 

 kinds of birds which different classes of men might use in this 

 way : the eagle and vulture were for emperors only ; the gyrfal- 

 con for kings ; the lesser falcons for nobles ; the harrier for es- 

 quires ; the merlin for ladies ; the goshawk for yeomen ; the 

 kestrel for servants ; the sparrow hawk for priests. 



Much of the value of various kinds of poultry comes from 

 their ability to destroy insects which damage vegetation, and to 

 maintain themselves on these and on foods not available for 

 the larger domestic mammals. The services of poultry in this 

 respect being limited to those insects that can be secured from 

 the ground, and to areas on which the birds can live safely and 

 do no damage to crops, we are dependent upon wild aerial 

 birds to keep insect life in check on trees and high bushes and 

 on land not occupied by poultry. 



Place of wild birds in civilization. As no insect-eating aerial 

 birds have been domesticated, the preservation of wild birds 

 that destroy insects is of as much importance to man as the 



