250 ECONOMIC ZOOLOGY 



potatoes have the same advantage over the grain, but they will freeze 

 in cold weather. The dry formula will keep indefinitely while the 

 wet may ferment. 



In distributing the poisoned baits a teaspoonful of the grain or a 

 piece of potato is put at each place. If meadow mice are the pest 

 that it is desired to kill the bait is put on the ground in their runways, 

 but to protect the birds, if grain be used, it should be covered with a 

 piece of bark, wood, stone or bush of some sort so that birds will not 

 see it; small boxes, pieces of tiles, tin cans, etc., can be used. 



If pine mice are the pest, the bait of whatever kind, may be dropped 

 into the open holes, or holes may be made into the tunnels with a 



FIG. 158. Field mouse skulls taken from pellets found under owl roost in 

 Smithsonian tower, Washington, D. C. (From Lantz, Field Mice as Farm and 

 Orchard Pests.) 



sharpened stick and the bait dropped in, so that bird life is not 

 endangered. 



As in the case of rats, an ounce of prevention is here worth a pound 

 of cure, and this may often be secured by clean cultivation of fields and 

 orchards, thus removing all hiding places and destroying runways 

 and nests. An orchard that is overgrown with weeds and grass is far 

 more often attacked by mice than one that is clean. 



One, if not the chief, reason for the great numbers of field mice in 

 our farming communities is the useless and senseless destruction of 

 their natural enemies. Of these enemies some are birds, some are 



