396 NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [12:9— Dec, 1916 



kill ten birds in a day. Mr. H. Linwood White of Maynard tells 

 me that a cat owned by one of his neighbors recently brought in 

 six adult birds to her young in a day. Mr. Walter P. Henderson 

 of Dover has seen a cat with three different birds in two hours. 

 Mr. J. M. Van Huyck of Lee has seen cats hunting in the meadows 

 for ground birds, getting both old and young, and striking down 

 swallows as they flew over the grass. Mr. A. K. Learned of 

 Gardner has known a cat to kill nine tree swallows in one day. 

 Mr. E. Colfax Johnson of Shutesbury says it is a common sight 

 to see a cat eating a bird. Mr. D. T. Cowing of Russell asserts 

 that his cat lived ten years and killed 170 birds of which he knew 

 and believes that more were killed. Mr. Edward T. Hartman, 

 secretary of the Massachusetts Civil Service League, says that 

 where he lives he commonly sees cats hunting birds, and that he 

 has known them to catch a great many. Mr. Frank E. Watson 

 has no doubt that he has taken 100 birds away from his cat. 

 Mr. George H. Hastings of Fitchburg had a cat that killed at 

 least one bird a day in summer, and was known to kill 31 "in one 

 season. Mrs. Charles L. Goldthwait of Peabody called the atten- 

 tion of the owner of a cat to the fact that it had just killed a gold- 

 finch ; the owner said that the cat had killed several birds daily, 

 and that it could not be prevented. Mr. A. M. Otterson of Hall, 

 N. Y., has known a cat to kill 13 birds in a day, and to strike 

 down swallows in flight. Mr. George G. Phillips, a member of 

 the Bird Commission of Rhode Island, writes from Greene, R. I., 

 that it is the commenest of sights to see cats hunting birds, and 

 that the young in eight different nests about his house were 

 destroyed by neighbors' cats last summer. 



Number of Birds Killed per Day, Week, Month, and Year. — 

 "Numerous correspondents have known individual cats to kill 

 from two to eight birds in a day, but the average is much smaller 

 than this. Two hundred and twenty-six correspondents report 

 the maximum number of birds they have known to be killed by 

 one cat in a day, and the day's work for these 226 cats is 624 birds, 

 or 2.7 birds per cat per day. Only 33 of my correspondents 

 have kept any record of the number of birds killed by a cat in a 

 week, but these 33 cats killed 239 birds in a week, or 7.9 birds 

 per cat. Only 15 have kept any record of the number of birds 

 killed in a month, and these 15 cats have killed 307 birds, or 20.4 

 birds per cat per month. 



