COMMON INSECTS AND BIRDS 139 



worm, the cut worm, the cinch bug, and the Hessian fly, the San 

 Jose scale, the coddhng moth, which makes so many "wormy" 

 apples, the coton bole wevil, the aphides, the corn ear worm, and 

 the borers that get into the bark and body of the tree and spoil 

 the timber or kill the tree. These are a few of the injurious in- 

 sects. The Department of Agriculture at Washington has said 

 that they destroy more than twice as much as it costs to run all 

 our universities, colleges, public and private schools com- 

 bined. By destroying our crops, these harmful insects cost us 

 more than to educate all our children. So it is very necessary to 

 protect things that destroy the bad insects. It doesn't make any 

 difference where you live it is to your interest to destroy in- 

 jurious insects. If you live on a farm, insects will destroy your 

 crops, but if you live in town, you will have to pay higher prices 

 for what you eat as a result of insect pests. It will cost you more 

 for bread and meat if the insects destroy the farm crops. So 

 both the people who live in the country and the people who live 

 in the city must carefully protect everything which destroys 

 harmful insects or prevents their destructive outbreaks. 



Perhaps the most important thing we have to destroy insects 

 is our bird life on the farm. The group of birds to which the 

 wild turkey, prairie hen and bobwhite belong, is one of the best 

 groups of birds we have. It is out of this group of birds that 

 we bred our domestic chickens and turkeys, and of these, as 

 wild birds, perhaps the bobwhite or quails are the best. They 

 are great hands to destroy injurious insects and weed seeds. The 

 bobwhite likes to eat a great many things we wouldn't like. He 

 is very fond of beetles and grubs and he enjoys eating plump 

 fat potato bugs, and above all, he likes that bad-smelling, bad- 

 tasting chinch bug. Maybe you have tasted him, or his half- 

 brother, the stink bug, which you sometimes find on blackberries. 

 The bobwhite is very fond of these destructive insects and he 

 will eat literally hundreds of them at a meal. And so he does 

 a great deal of good by protecting wheat, oats and corn from 

 bad insects. He is one of the best birds we have and he ought to 

 be protected, particularly where he has become scarce. 



The mourning dove or "turtle-dove" does a great deal of 

 good by destroying weed seeds. He doesn't eat many insects 

 but he does like weed seeds and he will eat one thousand, two 

 thousand, and sometimes five thousand weed seeds at one break- 

 fast. If each of you had to go out and pull up two or three thou- 

 sand weeds before your breakfast, you would get pretty hungry. 

 Manv of the weed seeds eaten by these birds might grow and 

 produce weeds that we should have to plow out. 



